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THE DOCTRINESY 
MODERNISM 


Its Beliefs and Misbeliefs Weighed and Analyzed 


“4, 
OGicaL SERS” 





By 


LEANDER §. KEYSER, AM., D.D. 


Professor of Systematic Theology in Hamma Divinity School, 
Wittenberg College, Springfield, Ohio 


Author of “Contending for the Faith,” “Man’s First Disobedience,” 
“A System of Christian Evidence,” “A System of General 
Ethics,” “The Rational Test,” etc. 


PRICE 40 CENTS 


CHICAGO 
THE BIBLE INSTITUTE COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION 
826 North La Salle Street 


COPYRIGHT, 1925, BY 
LEANDER S. KEYSER 
Springfield, Ohio 


Printed in the United States of America 


CONTENTS 





CHAPTER PAGE 
A Modernist’s View of the Bible 
CEL Arr ye Hitt OSCIOK imi vc ik aye, bait Die beau A 
II. A Translation of the Old Testament 
(James Moffatt) - - - - - - - - - = 55 
III. The Faith of Modernism (Shailer Mathews) - - 76 


IV. Modernism and Evangelical Christianity (Editor of 
“The Christian Century,” Charles R. Brown, 
Henry Van Dyke) - - - - - - - - - 84 





| FOREWORD 
HE MODERNISTS whose doctrines are dealt with in 


this volume are the following: 


Harry EMERSON FospIck. 

James Morratr. 

SHAILER MATHEWS. 

CHARLES R. Brown. 

Henry VAN DYKE. 

THe Epiror oF “THE CHRISTIAN CENTURY.” 


In this connection the author desires to say that he cherishes 
no ill will toward the men from whom he feels compelled to 
differ. If here and there in this work some vigorous expressions 
should occur, they are to be ascribed, not to an unkindly temper, 
but to earnestness of conviction. The doctrines and methods of 
other leading Modernists might also have been examined and 
the book extended to large proportions; but it is believed that 
the analyses herein contained will reveal the fundamental weak- 
nesses of Modernism and the vital departures of its advocates 
from the plenary faith of the evangelical church. 

At this place an explanation seems to be necessary. The 
author, as one of the Associate Editors of The Bible 
Champion, Reading, Pa., has contributed quite a number of 
the ‘Notes and Comments” which appear in that journal. These 
are unsigned. Some of these paragraphs are included in this 
volume, either verbatim or somewhat revised. Readers who may 
note this correspondence will, therefore, understand that the 
author has not used other men’s material without quotation- 
marks, but in all cases only his own. 

L. S. K. 

Hamma Divinity ScHOOL, 

Springfield, Ohio. 





THE DOCTRINES OF 
MODERNISM 


CHAPTER I 


A MODERNIST’S VIEW OF THE BIBLE 


, \HIS FIRST chapter shall be devoted to an analysis of 
Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick’s recent book (published in 
the fall of 1924), entitled ““The Modern Use of the 

Bible.”* The evangelical believer reads this book with mingled 
emotions and reactions. He cannot help feeling grateful for many 
good and true statements which it contains. After our author 
goes through the Bible with his rationalistic processes, perhaps 
one should be glad that anything at all worth while remains of 
the Christian system of truth and revelation. Perhaps it is better, 
when a ship has foundered upon the shoals, to be able to salvage 
something from the wreckage than for the whole vessel and its 
entire cargo to be destroyed. 

Observe that we state these propositions in only a tentative 
way; for it may be, after all, that Dr. Fosdick’s way of treating 
the Bible is more insidiously dangerous than outright and frank 
hostility would be. Many people may be captivated by this 
subtle way of dealing with the Bible, and may for the nonce 
accept the rationalistic conclusions, only to find later on that 
the process logically overthrows the Bible entirely and leaves 
them on the high seas without a reliable compass and chart. 
Hence we say that partial truth mingled with error may lend to 
the latter only a more attractive and inveigling power. 


*Some notes on his last two sermons at the First Presbyterian Church, 


. New York, are added to this chapter. 


7 


8 The Doctrines of Modernism 


Some Good Features 


The Christian apologist ought always to be fair, whether he 
is dealing with friend or foe. Therefore we will first note some 
good points in Dr. Fosdick’s production. 

1. He stands up for spiritual realities. He even becomes in- 
tense in his opposition to the materialistic science and philosophy 
of the day. He vigorously opposes the mechanistic view of the 
universe, saying (p. 167): “Never let the mechanistic philoso- 
phy imprison your mind. Keep the doors of expectancy open. 
Above all, believe in the living God until you see Him, in ways 
surprising in your eyes, working out His will for you and for 
the world.” 

True, he is more dogmatic here than argumentative, so that 
the materialist may come back at him with a demand for proof 
over against mere assertion. Yet we cannot help rejoicing that 
our liberalist utters a clarion voice in favor of God and other 
spiritual verities. Perhaps if he would make the same earnest 
effort to prove the untruth of materialistic monism that he 
makes to establish his rationalistic position, he might become 
an effective opponent of the present vogue for naturalism and 
mechanism. You see, even the materialists cannot be silenced 
by a mere ise dixit. No doubt they, too, are “from Missouri.” 

2. When Dr. Fosdick turns apologist, he can be effective. 
Note for example, what he says (pp. 52, 53) on the so-called 
“parallelisms” between the Biblical and the Babylonian accounts 
of creation. He says (and here he turns on his own critical 
school) : 

“Folks call them parallels, but I do not see how they do it 
if they have read them (the creation tablets of Babylon). They 
are full of the quarrels of the gods, the fear of primeval dragons, 
the war of Tiamat and the hosts of chaos against Marduk and 
the gods of light. They do, indeed, give us the same cosmology, 
but Marduk builds it up by slitting Tiamat like a flat fish, 
and making the firmament of her upper half and the earth of her 
lower. When one turns from this welter of mythology to the 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 9 


first chapter of Genesis, with its stately and glorious exordium, 
‘In the beginning God created the. heavens and the earth,’ one 
feels as though he had left miasmic marshes for a high mountain 
with clean air to breathe and great horizons to look upon. Here 
a victory was gained for pure religion for which we can never be 
too thankful. In place of polytheism, ethical monotheism; in 
place of mythology with ugly dragons and disgraceful fights, one 
God transcendent, who says, ‘Let be,’ and it is; in place of 
political desire to exalt Marduk,.god of Babylon, a religious de- 
votion which makes the chapter read more like a psalm than 
a cosmology; in place of man created that the gods may have 
some one to offer sacrifices to them, man made to be and fitted 
to be the friend and son of God—such are a few of the contrasts 
between the so-called parallels of Babylonia and the magnificent 
first chapter of the Book. The only way to feel the force of this 
is to read the documents. See if you do not come from the 
old Semitic heritage to the Biblical account as Stade came from 
the so-called Eden story of Babylonia to the Eden story of the 
Scripture, saying that it was like passing from the slough of a 
village cesspool to a clean mountain spring.” 

There! is not that well done? The veriest orthodox apologist 
could not have done it better. Only a few questions stir in one’s 
mind at this point. If the writer of Genesis I reached such a 
true basis and such a high plane of thought in the first verse of 
the Bible, how could he have dropped into so many crude errors 
in the subsequent verses, in which quite a detailed cosmogony 
is recited? And, besides, if the Holy Spirit inspired the noble 
exordium of the first verse, would He have left the writer to 
indulge in mere guesses in the rest of the narrative? Again, how 
did the Biblical writer of that remote age contrive to strike the 
high note of ethical monotheism, seeing he was surrounded on 
every hand by nations and tribes steeped in animism and poly- 
theism? Still more, is it not like coming from a cesspool to a 
clean mountain spring to contrast the origin of man, coming up 
from a brute ancestry and living in a noisome jungle, with 
the Biblical account of man directly created a rational and 


10 The Doctrines of Modernism 


moral being in the divine image and placed in a delightful 
garden.* 

3. Our author also upholds the wonder and uniqueness of 
Jesus Christ (pp. 210-212), and strikes hard at people who 
cannot appreciate “the major facts of human life.” Of the un- 
precedented person and influence of Christ he says (p. 211): 
“If anybody had told us this in advance, how impossible it would 
have seemed! But it is true; it actually has happened; the fact 
is here. Io many of us it is the most considerable fact that 
ever took place on this planet.” 

We quote again (p. 271): “‘Not only because Jesus was 
human, but because Jesus was divine, the revelation of the living 
God who seeks to be incarnate in every one of us, does the whole 
book vibrate with expectancy. ... He is unique.” Then 
follows the quotation: 


“No mortal can with Him compare. 
Among the sons of men.” 


On the next page (272) we read: “Of all foolish things I can 
think of nothing more foolish than, looking back over our race’s 
history and discerning amid its tragedy and struggle this out- 
standing figure spiritually supreme, to minimize him, to tone 
down our thought of him, to reduce him so that we can be like 
him. Rather let us exalt him! If God be not in him, God is not 
anywhere. The best hope of mankind is that the living God is 
in him, and through him may flow down through all the secret 
runnels of the race.” 

One cannot help rejoicing over this testimony to Christ. 
Only we would gently inquire where Dr. Fosdick gets his 
knowledge of our Lord and His unique characteristics. He 
would have to reply, from the New Testament, which is the 
only authoritative source-book we have. But suppose the New 

“This query is injected here because Dr. Fosdick holds to the theory of 


evolution. We wish that he and his fellow-evolutionists would consider our 
question seriously. 


tIn spite of the praise here bestowed upon Dr. Fosdick, we shall be 


compelled, later on, to show that he holds defective views of the person 
and incarnation of our Lord. 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 11 


Testament is as unreliable as our author elsewhere makes it out 
to be! Does not that cast dubiety on our Lord? Is the Christ of 
Fosdick and his school the real divine-human historical Christ 
of the Bible and of the evangelical church? Is He not rather 
the Christ of the Modernist’s imagination? 

But now we must turn from praise to criticism. Greatly as 
we regret to say it, we find in this volume much error mingled 
with truth; at least, such is our sincere judgment. Therefore, 
in all kindness and frankness, we must proceed to show wherein 
we cannot help believing that Dr. Fosdick is mistaken. 


The Doctrine of the Bible 


The logical place to begin is with this question: What is our 
author’s attitude toward the Bible? 

Without parley the answer may be summed up thus: It is 
that of the old rationalism given a more spiritually heightened 
character. In essence it is not new. The difference is that Fos- 
dick does not employ the cold, hard Biblical criticism of the more 
radical school. He has warmth and fervor and even unction. 
Hence, while he has a warm mysticism which the Graf-Well- 
hausen school did not know, he is not as logical as they. He 
stops before he takes the final leap to the logical conclusion to be 
drawn from his premises. 

Further, instead of calling the ultimate authority in religion 
the human reason, he calls it ‘‘experience.’’ Only those parts of 
the Bible are to be accepted which tally with man’s present “ex- 
perience.” There are many things in the Bible which we cannot 
experience; these we may cast aside as ‘outmoded categories,” 
and may still be good Christians, if we have had the aforesaid 
“experience.” Only the things that the ‘modern man” can 
experience are the “abiding” realities; all the rest is temporary 
scaffolding, to be torn down and thrown into the scrap heap— 
except, of course, that it must be preserved to show us what 
“progress” we have made since Bible times. For each individual, 
it is not the Bible, but ‘experience,’ which is the ultimate 
authority in religion. 


12 The Doctrines of Modernism 


And how, according to our Modernist, was the Bible pro- 
duced? Nowhere does he say or admit that it is the product of 
direct divine revelation, in spite of the fact that the Bible says 
again and again that God spoke directly to the patriarchs and 
prophets. Accepting the results of the so-called Higher Criticism 
according to Toy, Creelman, Bewer, e¢ alii., he rearranges the 
books of the Bible in such a chronological order as to fit into 
the theory of evolution (pp. 6, 7), and then declares that the 
holy book is the product of development.* Speaking of the 
results of this critical method, he says (p. 7): ‘It means that 
we can trace the great ideas of Scripture in their development 
from their simple and elementary forms, when they first appear 
in the earliest writing, until they come to their full maturity 
in the latest books. Indeed, the general soundness of the critical 
results is tested by the fact that, as one moves up from the 
earlier writings toward the later, he can observe the develop- 
ment of any idea he chooses to select, such as God, man, duty, 
sin, worship.” ‘This doctrine is reiterated several times in dif- 
ferent phrasing. On page 1t we find this: “We know now 
that every idea in the Bible started from primitive and child- 
like origins, and, with however many setbacks and delays, grew 
in scope and height toward the culmination in Christ’s gospel. 
We know now that the Bible is the record of an amazing 
spiritual development.” (Italics ours.) Looking at the Bible as 
the product of evolution and interpreting it accordingly is what 
Dr. Fosdick means by “the new approach to the Bible.” Every- 
thing must be transposed and manipulated to agree with 
the theory of gradual development. Whatever does not 
tally with that theory is politely bowed out as an “outmoded 
category.” 


.*“But has Dr. Fosdick never read or heard of the many incisive works 
written by conservative scholars in opposition to the dissecting Biblical 
criticism and the various documentary theories? For an extensive list of 
such works see the present author’s “A System of Christian Evidence” 
caat'p edition, 1924), published by The Lutheran Literary Board, Burlington, 
owa. What is the motive back of this persistent policy on the part of the 
Modernists of ignoring the works of conservative Biblical scholars? Such a 
procedure may be considered “good politics,” but, to our mind, it is not 
good ethics, 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 13 


It is needless to say that this view does not agree with the 
Biblical representation, which plainly sets forth the record of a 
series of special divine theophanies and revelations. It is also 
antipodes apart from the doctrine of historic and evangelical 
Christianity. Then Dr. Fosdick, going on the assumption that 
the Bible is the product of human “development,” proceeds to 
point out, after the manner of Thomas Paine, a number of bad 
things and crude errors that he believes he finds in the Bible. 
For example, the Jehovah of the Old Testament was a God 
with “geographical limitation.” He was the God of the 
Hebrews alone, and had no care for other nations. In other 
words, he was a “‘clan god,” although Fosdick does not use that 
expression. He cites Bade, however, as one of his authorities 
(p. 64), and Bade does call Israel’s Jehovah a ‘“‘clan god’— 
with a small ‘“‘g.”* Neither will Dr. Fosdick allow that there 
are any foregleams or adumbrations of New Testament truths 
to be found in the Old Testament. All is a matter of human 
“development.” 

To prove that he manipulates the Old Testament narratives 
to harmonize with the development theory, we quote the 
footnote on page 12: “The reader, of course, must never take 
the actual order of documents in our Bible as indicative of the 
chronological order in which they originally were produced. 
The first chapter of Genesis, for example, is very late. For 
information see Bibliography at the close of this lecture.” 
Referring to the said Bibliography (pp. 31, 32), we find nine- 
teen titles of books, every single one written by a liberalist. 
There is not a conservative writer among them. 


_*With what he hopes may be regarded as ae peiay | modesty, the author of 
this brochure would refer to_his work, ‘‘Contending for the Faith,” published 
in 1920 (George H. Doran Company, New York), in Chapter V of which he 
deals at some length with Dr. Bade’s allegation that the Jehovah of Israel 
was merely a henotheistic deity (a “clan god”). In that chapter many reasons 
are given for the view that Jehovah revealed Himself as the universal God, 
the God of the whole earth, and that the patriarchs and prophets so regarded 
Him. He was the God of Israel in a specific sense, while in the general 
sense He was the one and only true God of all nations, while all other gods 
were depicted as idols. However, it is perhaps too much to ask a liberalist 
to read a conservative book. In Dr. Fosdick’s Bibliography he cites many 
authors, all of them liberalistic but three—Orr, Thorburn and WER: 
Mackintosh. For an extended list of conservative works, see the author’s 
“A System of Christian Evidence,” as indicated in a footnote ué supra. 


14 The Doctrines of Modernism 


Since, then, according to Dr. Fosdick, the Bible is not a 
record of special divine revelations, but of human evolution in 
matters of ethics and religion, he can go through it deftly with 
his rationalistic knife-blade, cut out what does not meet his 
approval, call it an ‘outmoded category,” and leave intact only 
those things that agree with his conceptions. Thus the Bible is 
a very human and errant book. True, at one place (p. 24) he 
concedes that it is a “progressive revelation.’ But how incon- 
sistent! Would God have given a “revelation” worthy of the 
name that was rife with error, that contained many “categories” 
which fallible men would afterward have to ‘“‘decode”’? 

Observe another case of bad reasoning. He quotes with 
approval Hebrews 1:1, 2: ‘God, having of old time spoken 
unto the fathers in the prophets by divers portions and in divers 
manners, hath at the end of these days spoken unto us in His 
Son.” Would God have spoken by the prophets in crude and 
erroneous “categories”? If He did, how may. we know that 
He spoke the truth in His Son? Yes, this rationalistic con- 
ception of the Bible makes everything shaky and uncertain. 
Many people will ask in distress, “What can we believe?” 


The Biblical Categories Rejected 


Let us amplify still further upon Dr. Fosdick’s exact attitude 
toward the Bible. According to the indicia of this his last and 
probably most matured production, it is this: The ‘Biblical 
categories” in which religious truth was viewed and expressed 
by the writers of the Bible and the characters of the Bible can- 
not be accepted by the “modern man.” 

He can accept only those “essential” realities which are re- 
producible in his own “experience.’”’ Thus the Bible is to be 
tested by the Modernist’s experience: his experience is not to be 
tested by the Bible. This position indicates how far our author 
has departed from the evangelical position and how positively he 
has aligned himself with liberalism. It certainly was time for 
him to find out that he was out of harmony with the Presby- 
terian Church, for one of whose congregations he has been 


‘ 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 15 


steadily preaching for a number of years. Not only was he 
out of accord with that denomination, but his teaching was 
and now is an actual sapping of its foundational principle, 
which accepts the Bible as the norm in all matters of faith and 
practice. 

Let us make Dr. Fosdick’s position clear by concrete 
examples. He says that there are ‘certain typical contrasts be- 
tween Biblical thinking and our own” (p. 98). Then he adds. 
“For example, I believe in the persistence of personality through 
death, but I do not believe in the resurrection of the flesh. 
Many of our forefathers* could not conceive immortality apart 
from a resurrected body.” Strange as it may seem, he holds 
that Israel received the doctrine of resurrection from Zoroas- 
trianism during the time of the Exile, and brought it back to 
Palestine, where it prevailed at the time of our Lord’s advent, 
and He and His apostles adopted it, even though it was an 
error. ‘“This mental frame-work in the minds of New Testa- 
ment folk is revealed in passage after passage,” says our 
Modernist (p. 101). “The new and vivid hopes of life eternal 
which came with Christ still clothed themselves in a familiar 
category. In the book of Revelation the whole Zoroastrian- 
Jewish paraphernalia was employed with picturesque effect.” 
This was “archaic phrasing.” 

All this means that the doctrine of the resurrection of the 
body is an ‘‘outmoded category” for the ‘modern man.” Yet it 
was clearly taught by Christ and His apostles. Note our Lord’s 
words (John 6:44): “No man can come to me, except the 
Father which sent me draw him; and I will raise him up at the 
last day.” On the day of Pentecost, under the dominating influ- 
ence of the Holy Spirit, Peter committed the blunder of insisting 
on the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ! But that makes no 
odds to the Modernist; the resurrection of the body is an 

*Dr. Fosdick often uses the phrase, “our forefathers.’”” Whom does he mean? 
The doctrines he opposes were taught by Christ and His apostles. Does he 
mean to call them “our forefathers’? He should have been frank enough to 
say, “Christ and his apostles could not conceive immortality apart from a resur- 


rected body,” and should not have disguised his meaning by using the phrase, 
“our forefathers.” 


16 The Doctrines of Modernism 


outworn category; the “abiding element” in the New Testament 
teaching is the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. Do you 
not see what such a mode of treatment does with the Holy 
Scriptures ? 

One is put into an interrogative temper here. If the Bible is 
at all divinely inspired, as Dr. Fosdick seems to indicate at 
various places in his book (pp. 24, 30), one cannot help wonder- 
ing why the Holy Spirit led the Biblical writers to use so many 
blundering ‘categories.’ Why did Christ Himself employ 
“ohrasings” that have deceived many millions of people for 
many centuries, so that only now, since the rise of Modernism, 
are they beginning to be corrected and understood? Christ 
declared that He was “the way, and the truth, and the life.” 
He promised His disciples that they should know the truth, 
and the truth would make them free. Yet He led them to 
employ mistaken “categories” ! 

One cannot help wondering, too, whether Dr. Fosdick really 
means to teach that our Lord got His conception of a bodily 
resurrection from Zoroastrianism. If so, He got it from a 
pagan source, and was mistaken! How, then, could Christ 
be the divine Saviour of the world? If He was so sadly mistaken 
about the resurrection of the body, how can we trust our eternal 
well-being in His hands? Did St. John also adopt a wrong 
“category” in the revelations he described? Did he get his ideas 
from Zoroastrianism? On this point he differs vitally from 
Dr. Fosdick; for St. John says, “I was in the Spirit on the 
Lord’s day.” Who is correct, Fosdick or St. John? Let us 
weigh the question seriously. 

Is our author’s rejection of bodily resurrection consistent? 
He accepts the theory of evolution. He believes that man’s 
body was evolved by an age-long process (millions of years) 
from the amoeba, the worm, the primates, etc.* And God did 
it all. Yet He gives to man a body for only a few brief years, 
and then lets it die and return to dust forever, with no further 


“Just here we would like to ask Dr. Fosdick whether he has “experienced” 
evolution from an animal ancestry? 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 17 


destiny! What a waste of time and energy! What a superfluous 
work! 

On the other hand, the Christian view teaches that the body 
will be resurrected and glorified, and reunited with the re- 
deemed soul. for an immortal life of righteousness and felicity. 
That view makes the creation of man’s corporeal nature, and 
also the creation of the vast physical universe, a worthwhile 
work—one that was worthy of an all-wise and beneficent God. 
One cannot help wondering why God made so vast a physical 
cosmos if man’s soul only, and not his body, is designed for an 
immortal destiny. And if human souls are to exist forever and 
ever only in the disembodied state, what use will God make 
throughout eternity of His immense physical universe? If, 
however, we grant that men’s bodies will be resurrected and 
glorified and reunited with their redeemed souls, the raison 
d etre of the material universe is adequately assigned; for with 
their souls they will enjoy communion forever with God and 
all spiritual beings, and with their bodies they will be vitally 
related to the glorified cosmos. 

In the same radical way Dr. Fosdick deals with the second 
coming of Christ (pp. 104-110), the existence of demons and 
angels (pp. 111-129), the Bible miracles (131-167), many 
Biblical ‘‘categories’’ respecting Jesus as the Messiah and as the 
Son of God. Every Biblical conception and representation must 
be “decoded” in order to agree with the “experiences” of the 
modern mind. In regard to our Lord’s second coming in visible 
form, that must be toned down and interpreted in terms of the 
natural progress of the gospel coming like leaven into the 
hearts of men. This view is certainly poles apart from the 
categories in which our Lord Jesus Christ represented His 
second advent (Matt. 25:31, 32; Mark 8:38; Luke 26; John 
5:28, 29). 

On page 129 we find a concise summary of Dr. Fosdick’s 
view of the Bible: ‘This, then, is the conclusion of the matter. 
It is impossible that a Book written two or three thousand years 
ago should be used in the twentieth century A. D. without hav- 


18 The Doctrines of Modernism 


ing some of its forms of thought and speech translated into 
modern categories. When, therefore, a man says, ‘I believe 
in the immortality of the soul, but not in the resurrection of the 
flesh; I believe in the victory of God on earth, but not in the 
physical return of Jesus; I believe in the reality of sin and evil, 
but not in the visitation of demons; I believe in the nearness and 
friendship of the divine Spirit, but I do not think of that exper- 
ience in terms of individual angels,’ only a superficial dogmatism 
can deny that that man believes the Bible. It is precisely the 
thing the Bible was driving at that he does believe.” 

Here one may well raise the question whether the Bible was 
“driving at” only the immortality of the soul when it taught 
that the body will be raised from the dead, or whether Jesus 
Christ was simply “driving at” the gradual progress of the 
gospel when He represented Himself as coming in the clouds at 
the last day to judge the whole world of humanity. At all 
events, such treatment of the Bible nullifies its authority and 
undermines its integrity. 

Again, when, in the foregoing quotation, Dr. Fosdick main- 
tains that the man who rejects so many categories of the Bible 
still can be said to “‘believe the Bible,’’ he makes an inaccurate 
statement. He should say of his assumed Modernist that he 
believes as much of the Bible as suits him and rejects the rest. 
To say that a man “believes the Bible,” when he believes only 
a part of the Bible, is using language inexactly. And that 
practice is responsible for much harm. 


A Religion for the Elite 


So much is said about “modern scholarship” in the volume 
before us that we fear the modernistic religion is not for un- 
learned people, but is meant only for the would-be intellectual 
aristocracy, the so-called “intelligensia.” It is not a very demo- 
cratic affair—this self-styled new-thought religion. The plain 
man can understand the simple, clear statements of the Bible 
and its obvious “categories,” but this nebulous, sublimated thing 
called Modernism he would have difficulty in comprehending. 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 19 


Yet our Lord gave thanks to the Father because He had 
hidden the things of the kingdom ‘‘from the wise and the 
prudent, and had revealed them unto babes.”’ He also declared 
that men must become like little children in order to enter 
the kingdom of heaven. Paul is no less explicit and 
trenchant, saying: “For the wisdom of this world is foolishness 
with God; for it is written, He taketh the wise in their own 
craftiness.” 

However, it is perhaps vain to quote the Scriptures to a 
Modernist, for he will probably reply, “Such Bible texts are 
not authoritative! they are only outmoded categories, and are 
not reducible to the experiences of the modern mind.” Yet the 
Christian religion has always been regarded as a universal 
religion, intended for the learned and the unlearned alike. 


The New Categories Not Permanent 


Our author admits that the new modes of thought and ex- 
pression may themselves presently be ‘‘outmoded”; another 
“decoding” will no doubt be done by the next generation. He 
thinks the liberalists ought to get together, and put their views 
into definite formulas as orthodox Christians have done in their 
great ecumenical and denominational creeds. But such formu- 
lations may not last long, for he says (p. 190), in advocating 
the need of a clear statement of the tenets of liberalism: 

“It is the crux of the whole matter for liberalism today. It 
is a challenge to some of the most serious thinking that ever 
has been done on this planet. We do well to retreat from old 
categories into the experiences behind them, but we must also 
enshrine those experiences in positive formulations, even though 
that means building up a new orthodoxy which in time will be 
dissolved by a new liberalism.” 

Thus in Modernism nothing is stable; all is in a state 
of flux; its adherents are “like a wave of the sea, driven by the 
wind and tossed.” And we are wondering what the coming 
liberalism will substitute for the ‘‘out-worn categories” of 
present-day liberalism. For example, what will be the future’s 


20 The Doctrines of Modernism 


mode of stating belief in the immortality of the soul? Fosdick 
rejects our Lord’s category of His apocalyptic second coming to 
judge the world, and believes that the gospel will gradually 
permeate and leaven the world by an evolutionary process. If 
the next generation of liberalists rejects Fosdick’s category, what 
are they going to put in its place? 

Sometimes the liberalists become so frank as to let the world 
know the real goal of their dangerous teaching. Here comes 
along Dr. Charles W. Eliot, another well-known Modernist, 
and imparts to the world this enlightening information: ‘“The 
new religion will recognize that there is nothing ultimate within 
its knowledge. It will seek an open field, constantly shifting, 
and will not pretend any final recommendation of any sort. The 
finite cannot expect by any efforts of its own to know the 
infinite.” 

Yes, that is a good descriptive phrase of the new religion: 
“constantly shifting.’ That is what it is. Do we want a 
shifting religion when we face the difficulties and trials of life 
and when we come at last to look into the face of the eternal 
future? How different is the Christian religion! “If ye abide in 
my Word, then shall ye be my disciples indeed, and ye shall 
know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” “Jesus 
Christ, the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” 


Some Missing Notes 


Granted that Dr. Fosdick has struck some of the real notes 
of the gospel, we are led to say that some of the major notes are 
sadly missing. He does not play the full orchestral music of the 
gospel of Christ. The note of redemption has not been sounded 
by our Modernist. There is nothing clear with regard to the 
chief mission of Christ’s coming to the earth, which was, 
according to the New Testament, to “save His people from 
their sins.” ‘The Son of man came to seek and to save that 
which was lost,” said our Lord. In the jingle of minor notes in ~ 
the Fosdick concert, this major note of redeeming love and grace 
is not heard. 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 21 


This means that the doctrine of atonement is omitted. “He 
was wounded for our transgressions,” etc., is not once quoted. 
Neither is any reference made to Christ’s giving “His life a 
ransom for many,” or His “‘shedding His blood for the remis- 
sion of sins.”’ No consciousness of such a doctrine as expiation is 
evident in Fosdick’s whole book; yet Paul said: “He who 
knew no sin became sin for us that we through Him might be 
made the righteousness of God”; also: “He was born of a 
woman, born under the law, that He might redeem them that 
are under the law.” In this whole book on ‘“The Modern Use of 
the Bible,” there is not a reference to the blood of Jesus Christ 
which cleanses from all sin (1 John 1:7). In many ways the 
New Testament emphasis is different from that of Dr. Fos- 
dick. We wonder how he would interpret this classical pas- 
sage (Rev. 7:14), a verse that has been the comfort of Chris- 
tians through all the centuries: ““These are they which came 
out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made 
them white in the blood of the Lamb.” Would he call it an 
“outworn category,’ which the Jews borrowed from the Zo- 
roastrians during their Exile? 

Neither do the great saving doctrines of justification by faith 
and salvation by grace find a place in this modernistic recon- 
struction. No clear note is sounded on the need of the new 
birth or regeneration. Nothing like an order of salvation is 
indicated. 

One is uncertain, too, whether the Godhead of our Lord is 
actually held. Rather, the idea seems to be that the man Christ 
is the best and clearest revelation of the character, love and 
will of God that we find anywhere; but no frank declaration is 
made that Christ, according to His deity, was the pre-existent 
and eternally begotten Son of the Father. Indeed, the doctrine 
of the Trinity is treated as an ancient outworn “phrasing” and 
“category” (pp. 188, 189, 234). Dr. Fosdick’s conception of the 
Trinity is that of the old economic Trinity, or the Trinity of 
manifestation, which was condemned as heresy by the early 
church. Read what he says on pages 188 and 189 and see. 


22 The Doctrines of Modernism 


And how superficial is his criticism of the Christian doctrine of 
the Trinity as “a mathematical formula about three being one 
and one three.’’ This statement proves on the face of it that 
he has not studied the evangelical doctrine of the Trinity 
enough to know what it really is.* 

Serious, indeed, is our Modernist’s inadequate conception of 
the incarnation. His doctrine is not that of a real divine in- 
carnation of the eternal Son of God, as it is taught in the New 
Testament. He teaches merely the doctrine of the divine im- 
manence in Christ. God was in Christ as He is, or may be, in 
us, only in a higher measure. Thus Christ was not different 
in kind from believers; He was different only in degree. This 
is the Modernist’s doctrine and its application: Since God was 
immanent in Christ, that fact connotes the possibility of His 
being immanent in all of us, if we will obey His teaching and 
follow His example. 

Thus our Modernist commits the grave error of confusing a 
divine incarnation with what has been known in all the Chris- 
tian centuries as the mystical union. ‘That is a pathetic error. 
Of course, all truly regenerated persons are mystically—that is, 
spiritually—united with God; but they do not look upon them- 
selves as examples of divine incarnation. They do not call them- 
selves “‘little Christs.”’ Fosdick’s theology does not truly grasp 
the exalted doctrine taught in St. John 1:14: “And the Logos 
became (egeneto) flesh, and tabernacled among us, and we 
beheld His glory.” 

There is no clear recognition of the pre-existence of the Son 
in happy fellowship with the Father from eternity. One 
wonders how our Modernist would interpret the words of 
Christ (John 17:5): “And now, O Father, glorify thou me 
with thine own self with the glory which I had with thee before 

*According to the orthodox doctrine, God is not one and three in the 
same respect, but one as to essence and three as to persons. He is a mental 
or spiritual Trinity, not a materialistic or mathematical Trinity. If the God- | 
head is not a real immanent Trinity, how could our Lord consistently use the 
following language: ‘Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the 


glory which had with thee before the world was”? Or was that only one 


of chistes mistaken ‘‘categories,” which must be “‘decoded” by the ‘“‘modern 
min 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 23 


the world was.” Would he empty this saying of its high and 
holy meaning by calling it an “outmoded category” of “our 
forefathers’? 

In regard to the person of Christ, we are compelled to con- 
clude from Dr. Fosdick’s treatment that he regards Him as a 
man, naturally generated (for elsewhere he has declared his 
rejection of the virgin birth), in whom God was especially 
immanent, thus furnishing the rest of the race prima facie 
evidence that He will be immanent in us. It is needless to say 
that this doctrine is far below the high and holy doctrine of the 
Scriptures, and of the evangelical church. 


The Claim of “Experience” 


Some notes ought to be made on Dr. Fosdick’s doctrine of 
“experience,” on which he lays the chief emphasis. He calls it 
“the most abiding element in human history” (p. 54). He 
devotes a whole chapter to “abiding experiences and changing 
categories’ (pp. 97-129). He calls experience the “basis of the 
Bible’s appeal” (pp. 169-174). The “heart of the Bible is its 
reproducible experiences” (p. 195). One “goes back to the 
Bible now in search of its repeatable experiences” (same page). 
“The abiding continuum of Christianity ... lies in basic 
experiences, which phrase and rephrase themselves in different 
forms of thought.” 

This conception of experience must be probed. Will it bear 
analysis? First, how many things in the Bible cannot be re- 
peated in our experience today! We cannot experience the 
creation of the universe by the Almighty, nor the making of 
light, nor the initiation of life, nor the creation of man in the 
divine image, nor the fashioning of his body from the soil, nor 
the Noachian deluge, nor the call of Abraham, nor the miracles 
of Christ, nor His death on the cross, and scores and scores 
more of the historical events narrated in the Bible. Surely Dr. 
Fosdick’s conception would reduce the “essential” parts of the 
Bible to extremely minute dimensions, leaving little or no his- 
torical foundation upon which to stand. We wonder, anyway, 


24 The Doctrines of Modernism 


how much of the Bible would be left if all its so-called “out- 
worn categories,” phrasings and representations were eliminated. 
We are curious to know how tiny a volume it would be. 
Moreover, such treatment would make the Bible in the main 
a very fantastic and unreliable book. Think of putting our trust 
for our temporal and eternal well-being in a book filled with so 
many erroneous “‘categories’”! What a strange welter of a book 
that must be which has erred so stupidly in its categories and 
yet has revealed to men the religion that saves them and. gives 
them ‘“‘abiding experiences” regarding the most vital matters! 
But have Dr. Fosdick and his school had an actual experience 
of the doctrines they continue to hold? For example, he says 
(p. 98): “I believe in the persistence of personality through 
death, but I do not believe in the resurrection of the flesh.” 
On page 129 he says that he believes ‘in the immortality of 
the soul,” but “not in the resurrection of the flesh.” But has 
he had an “experience” of the immortality of the soul? Has he 
had the experience of the “persistence of personality through 
death”? No living man has ever had such an experience. No 
one has ever had an experience that does not involve both the 
mind and the body, which always function together. Dr. 
Fosdick has never had the experience of a disembodied soul. 
He will have to wait until he dies to know by actual 
“experience” whether the soul can function without the body. 
But why does Dr. Fosdick believe in the persistence of the 
personal soul after death? Because he wants it to be true, and 
therefore has drawn such an inference from the reasonableness 
of the doctrine. Suppose some other man presents just as valid 
reasons for the immortal destiny of the body in conjunction 
with the soul, would not his logic be just as convincing as is 
that of our Modernist? Why would God expend so much time 
and pains in making the human body, and then give it an 
existence for only a few brief years? But the Modernist cannot 
“experience” the continuance of the soul in eternity any more 


than he can experience the resurrection of the body at some 
future time. 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 25 


We grant that there is an experience through Christian faith 
and the testimony of the Word of God that does give the 
regenerated Christian the assurance of the future life. No mat- 
ter how much of a materialist or agnostic a man may have been, 
when he has been truly converted he becomes inwardly assured 
of a future life. Note Christ’s words (John 6:54): “Whoso 
eateth my fiesh, and drinketh my blood, Aath eternal life; and I 
will raise him up at the last day.” If through faith in Christ 
we have eternal life, we are likely to now that we possess it; 
but this knowledge of our future existence does not exclude the 
resurrection of the body; for the same verse that assures us of 
eternal life also assures us that Christ will raise our bodies from 
the dead. Again, those who have been truly enlightened by the 
Spirit of God have tasted of “the powers of the world to come” 
(Heb. 6:5); but that precious experience does not imply a 
minus sign regarding the resurrection of the body. Thus we 
can say positively that no one has ever in this life had the “ex- 
perience” of “the immortality of the soul” aside from and ex- 
clusive of the resurrection of the body. 

At another place Dr. Fosdick says (p. 129) he believes “in 
the victory of God on earth, but not in the physical return of 
Jesus.” What! has he indeed had an experience of “the victory 
of God on earth”? He surely has not, for that victory is still far 
from being an accomplished fact. The only assurance we have 
that the kingdom of God will finally prevail in the earth is 
found in the Bible; but the Bible speaks just as explicitly of the 
visible return of our Lord, and connects it with the universal 
reign of God. 

Note again our author’s lame logic. In a footnote on page 12 
he says dogmatically: “The reader, of course, must never take 
the actual order of documents in our Bible as indicative of the 
chronological order in which they were originally produced. 
The first chapter of Genesis, for example, is very late.” Did 
Dr. Fosdick “experience” that the first chapter of Genesis is of 
“very late” composition? No; he and his school cannot base 
their radical conclusions on “experience.” They base them upon 


26 The Doctrines of Modernism 


the speculations of the disintegrating Biblical critics, for Dr. 
Fosdick here refers to the “bibliography at the close of this 
lecture,” all of it negative and liberalistic. He does not refer 
to the Bible itself or to the testimony of Christian “experience.” 

Thus we are compelled to say that our Modernist’s con- 
ception of a Christian experience has suffered some kind of a 
displacement of thought. His logic goes limping. He claims too 
much for his particular kind of experience, while at the same 
time it is far too meager to be a truly Biblical experience—an 
experience which means “being born again, not of corruptible 
seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth 
and abideth forever” (1 Pet. 1:23). To our way of thinking, 
the Modernist’s conception of a religious experience is too 
nebulous and uncertain to be of stabilizing and satisfying value 
to the soul. On the other hand, a genuine Christian experience, 
one begotten by the Holy Spirit through the Word of God, has 
for its chief content the assurance that Christ and the Bible are 
true; and that is certitude that gives satisfaction to the reason 
and uplift to the heart. 

This strange hypothesis of accepting only what is “repeatable 
in our experience” must be still further probed until we get to 
the bottom of it. Suppose we try to apply the principle to 
science, especially to cosmology and cosmogony. The Modern- 
ists must believe that at some time God created the primordial 
material of the universe. At least, we hope that they have not 
gone back to the materialism of the olden times which held that 
matter is eternal, or to the dualism of the Zoroastrians who 
taught the same doctrine. We take it for granted that, believing 
in God, the Modernists believe in the divine creation ex nihilo 
of the primitive material of the cosmos. But have they ever 
experienced such a creation? They know they have not. It is 
not a “repeatable experience.” 

Again, there must have been a time in the world’s history 
when there was no life on the globe. But life is here now, 
and that in vast abundance. Whence came the vital force or 
principle? If you reply that it came through spontaneous 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible ak 


generation, we reply that such a leap from the non-living to the 
living has never been “experienced”? by the Modernists nor by 
any one else. We see and experience nothing of the kind today. 
It is not a “repeatable experience.””’ Among the foremost biol- 
ogists of our day the doctrine of biogenesis holds the field.* 

On the other hand, if the Modernists hold that life came by 
divine creation, we again insist that this is not a matter of their 
experience. hey have never experienced the divine creation 
of life. If they believe it, then they believe something that is 
not “reproducible” in their experience. 

What is to be said about the origin of species? Most of the 
Modernists, perhaps all of them, contend for the theory of 
evolution. They feel sure of the doctrine of the transmutation 
of species some time in the long past. But is such a process “‘re- 
peatable” in their experience? Have they ever known one 
distinct type of vegetable or animal life to merge into another 
and a higher type by means of resident forces? ‘They have not. 
So here again they believe something that does not come within 
the range of their experience. 

As to the origin of man, the Modernists, all of them— 
we know of not a single exception—hold to the doctrine that 
man traces his pedigree back to a primate ancestry—that is, to 
animals still lower in the scale than the monkeys and the 
apes. Have they ever experienced such an evolution? Have 
they gone back through the millennia and actually witnessed an 
animal of any kind gradually evolving into a human being? 
They know they have not. Therefore they hold another doc- 
trine that is not “repeatable in their experience.” 

Dr. Fosdick seems to believe in a continuum of nature’s 
processes throughout all time (although he is not quite clear 
on this point). His idea seems to be that all things are going on 
now as they have always proceeded. He speaks disparagingly of 
miracles (p. 145): “If miracles had happened in the Bible and 
had not happened since, then God had changed His way of 


*Cf. the learned works of the well-known biologists, Edmund B. Wilson, 
Lorande Loss Woodruff and Vernon Kellogg. 


28 The Doctrines of Modernism 


running the world. At some definite date he had changed gear 
from one method to another. Such was the dangerous position 
in which the church was cornered in the eighteenth century,” 
etc. This would seem to imply that God’s processes were 
always the same as they are today. 

Let us analyze this conception. We do not today see new 
material substance created ex nihilo. ‘Then, if God created the 
heavens and the earth, there must have been a time when He 
did not work just as He is working today. We do not at present 
see life coming into existence from non-life; neither do we 
witness the creation of new life; therefore something must have 
occurred sometime in the past that does not occur now. Since 
we do not see one species of plant or animal merging into others 
today, nor new species being brought into existence by direct 
creation, there must have been a time when God wrought in a 
different fashion from His method as we observe it today. Thus 
the eternal continuum and uniformity of nature cannot be 
maintained. Therefore we are driven to the conclusion that 
many things must have taken place in the past that cannot 
be duplicated today in the Modernist’s experience. He is 
building his faith and hope on too small a foundation. It 
will not uphold the superstructure, but will let it topple to 
the ground. 

The modern conception of a dead level of continuity during 
all the past and in the present reminds us of Peter’s solemn 
rebuke of the uniformitarians of his time (2 Pet. 3:3,4), in 
which he spake of scoffers who are saying: “Where is the 
promise of His coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all 
things continue as they were from the beginning of the 
creation.” 

Then the apostle refers these scoffers to the miracle of 
the deluge that had occurred in the past and the miracle of 
the coming of the Lord which will occur in the future. But, of 
course, Peter was one of “our forefathers” who employed out- 
worn “categories” and “phrasings”! We see, therefore, what 
a futile and unreliable book Modernism makes of the Bible. 


‘A Modernist’s View of the Bible 29 


Miracle and Law 


A lengthy chapter of Dr. Fosdick’s book is devoted to this 
theme. One scarcely knows where to begin in dealing with this 
involved part of his discussion. For one thing, it reveals no 
knowledge of the many excellent works which have been writ- 
ten in defense of the miraculous element in the Christian 
religion. There is Dr. James Orr’s profound treatment in his 
well-known work, ‘“The Christian View of God and the 
World.” Dr. Theodore Christlieb, in his “Modern Doubt and 
Christian Belief,” canvassed the whole subject of miracles in 
connection with modern negations. Although his work was pub- 
lished in 1874, it is still relevant and has never been adequately 
answered. Every one who treats the subject of the supernatural 
and its relation to modern science should have acquaintance with 
Dr. Johannes Wendland’s “Miracles and Christianity,’ which 
is a clear and cogent treatment. It has been translated into 
English by that profound evangelical scholar, Dr. H. R. Mack- 
intosh, of Edinburgh. Miracles are also treated in an evangelical 
way by Nevison Loraine in his ‘“The Battle of Belief” (fourth 
edition, 1910). One ought also to read the chapter on “The 
Supernatural in Revelation” in Dr. W. St. Clair Tisdall’s fine 
work, “Religio Critici.” We have also found Dr. A. Huelster’s 
“Miracles in the Light of Science and History” very helpful 
and suggestive. The great apologies of Auberlen, Ebrard, 
Frank, Fairbairn, Ellicott, Wace, Stearns, Mullins, Luthardt, 
Hopkins, McGarvey, and others should not be ignored by the 
Modernists. Dr. A. F. Winnington Ingram, Bishop of London 
(formerly if not at present), in his ‘Reasons for Faith,” dis- 
cusses “Why I Believe in Miracles” in a most satisfactory way. 
The like may also be said of Dr. A. A. Brockington in his “Old 
Testament Miracles in the Light of the Gospel.” We cite . 
these volumes to show that the miraculous element, which is so 
prominent in the Bible, has received much attention from evan- 
gelical Christian apologists. 


30 The Doctrines of Modernism 


But what is Dr. Fosdick’s attitude toward miracles? He 
does not tread quite firmly here, and does not want to seem to 
be too dogmatic; but on the whole he discredits most of the 
Biblical miracles, rejects some of them outright, and in the final 
analysis reduces the miraculous merely to the operations of God 
in the human soul. That inner experience which God affords to 
Christians is the one repeatable and irreducible element in the 
supernaturalism that is so conspicuous throughout the Book of 
books. He seems to be willing to accept certain miracles that 
can be reproduced in our experience today, although the cate- 
gories, forms and ‘‘draperies” in which they are described in the 
Bible are not to be allowed. Here is an example of his treat- 
ment (p. 165): 

“For this is the principle on which alone Biblical miracles 
can have a vital part in our faith: Wherever a narrative in 
Scripture describes an experience in terms of miracle so that we 
recognize that the same kind of experience is open to us, or 
would be open if we were receptive of God’s incoming power, 
that narrative is fundamentally credible and useful.” 

Think the Bible through, friendly reader, and see how many 
of the miracles would be left if that rule were applied. We 
confess that our Modernist uses much tergiversation in trying 
to hold on to miracles, while at the same time rejecting them in 
reality. We quote what seems to be his conclusion of the whole 
matter (pp. 166,167): “It is this aspect of miracle that alone 
seems to me exciting and worth while. God guides men and 
nations as much now as He ever did; He empowers men, com- 
missions them, opens to them possibilities of abundant life, and 
has at His disposal and ours resources of which we have hardly 
touched the shallows. He is as ready now as ever to use His 
law-abiding powers to work out in ways surprising to us His 
will for us and for the world. Belief in miracles, therefore, is 
not first of all an historical matter; it is a contemporary chal- 
lenge. To learn anew the power of prayer, to release through 
our lives a superhuman spirit into human affairs, to do things 
which cannot be done, until men find it easy to believe in God 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 31 


because of the evident marvels of His presence in us and through 
us—that is what it really means to believe in miracle. Faith in 
the miraculous is not primarily mental credence of past events; 
it is spiritual adventure into the release and use of divine power 
in our own day.” 

That is a laborious, and perhaps some people would say a 
rhetorical, effort to husband the miraculous while in reality 
rejecting it. We must leave it to our readers to judge whether 
what Dr. Fosdick tries to delineate is really miracle at all in the 
Biblical and Christian sense of the term. The operations of the 
Holy Spirit in men’s lives are not usually defined in our Chris- 
tian theologies as miracles. If they are miracles, they are con- 
fined to the spiritual realm. But the miracles of the Bible come 
out clearly into the physical realm, and are appealed to as such 
by Christ and His apostles. Fosdick’s philosophy would simply 
dessicate the real miracles of the Bible. Note what he says 
(p. 162): “I cannot think of miracles as intervention in a phi- 
losophically conceived cosmic system.” ‘That means that miracles 
in any true sense of the term must go. If God never intervenes 
in a world that has departed from Him through sin, but is in- 
variably bound by such laws as today govern the world, it is 
hopeless to expect any one to believe in the miraculous in the 
Biblical conception of signs and wonders. ‘To our mind, it is 
inexplicable that the Son of God would come to the earth, 
become incarnate, reveal the love and grace of God to mankind, 
and redeem them by His atoning act of sacrifice, without pre- 
senting something extraordinary as His credentials to prove that 
He came from the supernatural sphere. How would He ever 
have convinced a gainsaying and skeptical world that He was 
the divine Redeemer if He conformed all through His life to 
mere natural law and the mere course of natural events? 

On another page (165) our author says: “There are, how- 
ever, many miracles narrated in the Scripture which I cannot 
help believing.” ‘Then he at once proceeds to divest them of 
their miraculous character by saying that only “the abiding 
experience” in them is to be retained. Throughout his whole 


32 The Doctrines of Modernism 


discussion he uses the term “miracle” in a double sense; and 
the sense in which he holds the idea of miracles is not the 
well-known historical sense; neither is it the conception of the 
Biblical writers or of the adherents of the evangelical church 
from Christ and the apostles to the present day. 

Sadly enough, Dr. Fosdick tries to discredit the Bible miracles 
in three ways; first, by presenting them in a kind of ridiculous 
manner; (pp. 163,164) ; second, by calling them ‘“‘whimsicalities 
and irregularities” (p. 155); third, by putting them into the 
same class as the miracle-stories of the pagan religions and the 
medieval times (pp. 143-145). We had thought that almost all 
Christian people today were able to distinguish between true 
Christian miracles and those of an apocryphal or pseudo 
character.* 

On another page (157) Dr. Fosdick reduces the Biblical 
miracles to “the providence of God and His immediate presence 
and activity in the world.’ But that is not at all what the 
Biblical writers meant when they spoke of the “signs and 
wonders” which were given to attest the divine authority of a 
prophet or an apostle or of Christ Himself. Elsewhere (p. 156) 
Dr. Fosdick makes this statement: ‘Jesus never called on His 
followers as a test of discipleship to believe in narratives of other 
people’s marvellous deeds,” etc. But that is not a full and fair 
statement, and it looks as if there were something disguised or 
disingenuous about it. While Christ did not demand of people 
to believe in other people’s miracles, He did appeal to His own 
as works as reasons for belief in Him (John 10:37, 38): “If I 
do not the works of my Father, believe me not. But if I do, 
though you believe not me, believe the works; that ye may know, 
and believe, that the Father is in me, and lin Him.” (Cf. also 
John 14:11: 15:24.) When John the Baptist sent messengers 
to Jesus to inquire whether He was or was not the Christ, our 
Lord referred him to His miracles, a list of which He men- 

*In this connection we advise the reading of Dr. Benjamin B. Warfield’s 
“Counterfeit Miracles,” in which, with marvellous learning, he sets forth the 


antipodal differences between the Biblical miracles and the pretended miracles of 
paganism and the medieval ages. 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 33 


tioned, among them the curing of the blind and the raising of 
the dead (Matt. 11:2-6). In all kindness and earnestness we 
would ask, Did our Lord in these places employ “categories” 
that are now “outmoded” ? 

Let us note some of our Modernist’s positive statements. He 
says, “Approaching the Bible so, there are some narratives of 
miracles which I do not believe” (p. 163). Then he names 
some that he finds incredible—the incident of Elisha and the 
bears, the axe-head that was made to swim (a favorite object of 
derision among the infidels of the Paine-Ingersoll type), the 
sun standing still at Joshua’s command, Jonah and the great 
fish, “the magic fall of Jericho’s walls,” “the amazing tales of 
Elijah and Elisha,” the coin in the fish’s mouth, walking on the 
water, and “blasting a tree with a curse.” He may not mean it 
so, but he seems to refer to these Biblical events in such a tone 
as to cast a stigma upon them. Then he adds: ‘‘Certainly I find 
some of the miracle-narratives of Scripture historically incred- 
ible. Others puzzle me. I am not sure about them.” (p. 164). 
His evident conclusion is that no miracles have ever occurred in 
the physical sphere; if miracles ever have occurred or do occur, 
they belong only to the immanent and spiritual realm. ‘Thus all 
the supernatural events recorded in the Bible are simply to be 
shelved as “‘outworn categories.” It is easy to see what becomes 
of the Bible under such rationalistic knifing. It is a naive faith 
that can retain confidence in what is left of the holy Book after 
so many of its main parts have thus been thrown into the discard. 

The crucial question we raise now (it should have been put 
pointedly long ere this) is: Can a writer’s categories, phrasings 
and verbiage be rejected and the truth he meant to convey still 
retained? For example, if we were to say that John Jones 
walked to town, could that language be construed into meaning 
that he went to town in an automobile? Likewise when the 
Biblical writers report Christ as saying that He would raise 
people from the dead at the last day, can their language be so 
twisted as to mean that they were only “driving at” the idea 
of the soul’s survival after death? We hold that such construc- 


34 The Doctrines of Modernism 


tions are impossible. They nullify the very purpose of language, 
which is meant to convey clear and distinct truths and ideas. 


The Resurrection of Christ 


Regarding the resurrection of Christ’s body, Dr. Fosdick 
walks unsteadily. He does not seem to know whether he believes 
it or not. This is his way of putting it: ‘“Or what shall we say 
about the physical aspects of the resurrection of Christ? We 
believe that He is not dead but is risen;* that we have a living 
Lord. And yet we may not know what to make of narratives 
about His eating fish after His resurrection, passing through 
closed doors, and offering His hands and feet to the inquiring 
touch of Thomas.” 

Is Dr. Fosdick not aware that Christ, according to the New 
Testament, gave the said exhibitions for the very purpose of 
proving to His disciples that His resurrected body was a real 
physical body? Yes, the very body that was crucified and 
buried? The alternative is this: Dr. Fosdick must either 
question our Lord’s veracity or throw away the evangelical 
records of the New ‘Testament. Whichever horn of the 
dilemma he chooses, he derogates from the veracity and divinity 
of our Lord. If the evangelical records cannot be trusted here, 
they are rendered untrustworthy throughout; and so we are left 
in doubt with regard to the person and place of our Lord. It 
was His physical resurrection that restored the faith of His 
apostles, prepared them for Pentecost, and converted them into 
the heroic characters and witnesses they were. The resurrection 
of Christ is basic in the Christian religion. Paul declares in the 
most unmistakable terms that Christ’s resurrection is founda- 
tional: “And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, 





*A query rises here. Dr. Fosdick says (p. 98): “I believe in the persistence 
of personality through death, but I do not believe in_the resurrection of the 
flesh.” Yet here he says (p. 164): “We believe that He Wea is not dead 
but is risen.” Are not these statements contradicto What does our | 
Modernist mean by saying that Christ ‘is risen’? Does he mean that Christ’s 

soul goes marching on,” like the soul of John Brown? But that would be no 

resurrection from the dead. The soul does not die, and hence cannot be 

ete pi Our friends, the Modernists, should not use such confusing 
e. 


A Modernis?’s View of the Bible 35 


and your faith is also vain. Yea, and we are found false wit- 
nesses of God; because we have testified of God that He raised 
up Christ” (1 Cor. 15:14,15ff). Contrast Fosdick’s faltering 
gait on the doctrine of Christ’s resurrection with Paul’s firm and 
stately tread: “Who was delivered for our offenses, and was 
raised again for our justification” (Rom. 4:25). 

Dr. Fosdick may reply that he does not positively reject the 
Biblical teachings of Christ’s physical resurrection. To this we 
would respond: First, he certainly casts doubt upon it and so 
upon the whole Christian system; second, if he can believe in 
Christ’s physical resurrection, he accepts one of the greatest 
miracles* recorded in the Bible, and there is no reason, then, 
why he should not accept all the rest of the miracles. Let him 
say which alternative he will select. To reject the miracle of 
our Lord’s physical resurrection is to reject His own clear and 
oft-reiterated declarations. Again and again He foretold that 
He would rise again the third day; and after He had risen, He 
made His apostles believe that His resurrection was a bodily 
one. 

A few questions are surely germain at this point: If Christ’s 
body did not rise, how shall we explain the empty tomb? What 
became of Christ’s body? How did Christ convince His dis- 
heartened apostles that He was the true Messiah? How did 
He restore their faith and prepare them for Pentecost? How 
did the Christian church get started if Christ never rose from 
the dead? Why did Peter on the day of Pentecost preach 
the resurrection of Christ as the chief and basal fact? Why did 
all the apostles proclaim it? Why were they willing to suffer 
and even to die for the gospel of the resurrection? Cannot any 
one see the fateful outcome to Christianity if doubt is cast on 
the resurrection of our Lord? 


The Bible a Great Book 


One of the outstanding claims of the Modernists is that their 
views transform the Bible into such a great and luminous book 


“Yes, and it was a great biological miracle, too—the very kind he has else- 
where treated with scorn. 


36 The Doctrines of Modernism 


for them. Dr. Fosdick, in his volume, makes this claim, and 
says that he has the testimony of others to the same effect. 

Of course, it naturally seems to be a great book to these 
advocates! And there is a reason. When they can throw over- 
board whatever does not suit them in the Bible, and accept only 
what their proud reason approves, they will naturally think 
that what they leave of the Bible makes a great book! Is it not 
the verdict of their own wisdom? 

Those of us who accept the Bible in all its fullness also 
esteem it as a great Book, but for a very different reason. To us 
it is a great Book, not because we have reasoned it out, or 
because we have sifted it with our puny intellectual processes, 
but because it is God’s special revelation, and He gives us the 
assurance by His Holy Spirit and on account of His mercy and 
grace, that it is His special revelation to us, His unworthy 
children. ZIT God we give all the praise. There is a funda- 
mental difference between the spirit of Modernism and that of 
evangelical Christianity. 


Jesus’ Faith in Men 
Dr. Fosdick speaks of “‘Jesus’ faith in men” (p. 224). “To 


believe in men as Jesus did,” is one of his favorite expressions. 
But where does the New Testament teach that Jesus had faith 
in men? We cannot find a single passage of Scripture which 
teaches that doctrine. Indeed, the New Testament seems to 
teach something quite different. In Matt. 10:17 Christ is re- 
ported to have said: ‘‘But beware of men; for they will deliver 
you up to the councils,” etc. In Matt. 16:23 Christ said to 
Peter: ‘Thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those 
that be of men.” In Matt. 15:9: ‘But in vain they do worship 
me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men”; 17:22: 
“The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men;” 
Mark 7:21-23: ‘For from within, out of the hearts of men, 
proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornication,” etc.; John 12:43: 
“For they loved the praise of men more than the praise of God.” 
Here is a passage that ought to be decisive on this point 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 37 
(John 2:24, 25): “But Jesus did not commit Himself unto 


them, because He knew all men, and needed not that any one 
should testify of man; for He knew what was in man.” 

So it is not Biblical to speak of our Lord’s “faith in men.” 
With Him it was not a matter of faith, He knew men; knew 
that they were naturally evil. Yet He also knew that they were 
capable of being saved, and so He came to save them. But that 
was knowledge, not faith. 

So here again the liberalist has been convicted of poor reason- 
ing and un-Biblical teaching. The question arises, Why do our 
friends, the liberalists, so often fall into error? Is it because they 
substitute their own wisdom for the Word of God? Perhaps 
their frequent lapses in logic is only another confirmation of the 
Pauline teaching that ‘the wisdom of men is foolishness 


with God.” 


Who has “Another Religion’? 


Since the publication of his book, Dr. Fosdick has been 
saying some more or less erratic things in his sermons. One of 
these discourses, preached on February 22, 1925, was reported 
in full in a prominent New York paper which aims at the 
utmost accuracy. That journal says: ‘‘Dr. Fosdick made an 
attack on the Fundamentalists, declaring that they deliberately 
turn away from the religion of Jesus to another kind of 
religion.” 

It is difficult to see why any one would make such a state- 
ment. It surely is a mark of fallacious reasoning. Let us see. 
The only authoritative knowledge we have of Jesus is what we 
find in the New Testament. Dr. Fosdick himself can go back to 
no other source. But the Fundamentalists accept the New 
Testament in full, and therefore accept the Christ who is set 
forth in that sacred volume. Then how can it be that they 
have “deliberately turned away from the religion of Jesus to 
another kind of religion”? Where will Dr. Fosdick, or any one 
else, find out what the religion of Jesus is, except in the New 
Testament records? Is it not Dr. Fosdick himself who has 


38 The Doctrines of Modernism 


turned away from the religion of Jesus, and has devised a 
religion of his own thinking? Thus he seems to try to fasten 
upon the Fundamentalists the very error of which he himself i is 
guilty. 

Another Fosdick error is the following, quoted directly from 
his sermon: “I, too, have a religion about Jesus. I believe great 
things concerning him. But the center of my religion is in the 
Gospels, not in the theologians; in the Master’s way of living, 
not in what men have said about him.” 

Here Dr. Fosdick is again mistaken. He does not seem to 
know himself very well—although we do not wish to reflect 
unkindly upon his lack of the power of self-analysis. The center 
of his religion is not in the Gospels; for he accepts only such 
parts of them as suit him, while he rejects the rest. His own 
book is witness against him. Here is one example: All the 
Gospels teach explicitly that Jesus arose from the dead, and 
report Jesus Himself as claiming to have been resurrected 
bodily; but Dr. Fosdick declares in his book that he does not 
believe in a bodily resurrection of any kind; he thinks it one of 
the “outmoded categories” in which the Gospel writers clothed 
their beliefs. This proves, therefore, that he has not come to 
grips with himself when he says that his religion ‘‘centers in the 
Gospels.” 

His religion, says Dr. Fosdick, does not center ‘in the the- 
ologians.’’ This is another of those pointless remarks which are 
characteristic of the Modernists. Nobody wants Dr. Fosdick 
to center his religion in the theologians. We want his religion 
to be centered in Christ and the Bible. His remark is nothing 
but an unwarranted thrust at theologians. Evangelical Chris- 
tians do not put their trust for salvation in the theologians or 
their theologies, but only in Christ. If they accept the systems of 
certain theologians, it is simply because they believe that those 
learned men have set forth the true doctrine of Christ and 
the Bible. 

Still, it should be added that the orthodox theologians draw 
their systems of doctrine from the Holy Scriptures. They do not 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 39 


manufacture them out of their own brains. In this respect they 
differ from the Modernists, who instead of going to the Gospel 
as the true religious sources, draw their theology out of their so- 
called “experience” and the rationalizing of the “modern mind.” 
Dr. Fosdick’s book is proof of the truth of this statement. Note 
the many gospel “‘categories” that he calls “outmoded” and that 
he declares must be rejected. 

Our Modernist has fallen into rather a pessimistic mood, not 
unmingled with a tang of bitterness. He makes this plaint: 
“Christianity to-day has largely left the religion which Jesus 
preached, taught and lived, and has substituted another kind 
of religion.” Then he refers belittlingly to the F undamentalists, 
showing that he is driving at them. 

This is wrong again. The religion which Jesus preached, 
taught and lived is depicted in the four gospels. It is found 
there or it is found nowhere. But evangelical Christians go 
right to those inspired sources for the principles of their religion. 
They do not evolve it out of their own consciousness. There- 
fore they have not “substituted another kind of religion” for 
the religion of Jesus Christ. 

It must be said, kindly but firmly, that it is Dr. Fosdick and 
his fellow-Modernists who are proposing a substitute. Here is 
the proof: Jesus clearly and positively taught that the human 
body shall be raised from the dead at the last day.* Dr. Fosdick 
says he does not believe in such a resurrection. Who, then, is it 
that has “substituted another religion” ? 


Strange Views of Religion 


A strange distinction is sought to be drawn by our Modern- 
ist—a distinction between ‘“‘the religion of Jesus’ and “the 
religion about Jesus.” He intimates that the Modernists hold 
the former, the Fundamentalists the latter. This is a false and 
invidious comparison. But we must see what Dr. Fosdick means 

*John 5:21, 28, 29; 6:39, 40, 44, 54. All these passages are in the Fae 
according to St. Jo 1: which "Dr. Fosdick declares “s iritualizes” rist’s 


second coming, “heightens the miraculous element” (see “The Modern Use of 
the Bible,” pp. 108, 109, 148). 


40 The Doctrines of Modernism 


by “the religion of Jesus.’’ At one place in his sermon, he defines 
it thus: “His filial fellowship with God, his sense of duty, his 
courage, kindliness and sacrifice, his way of living.” 

Precisely! We have known all along that the Modernist’s 
conception of the religion of Jesus was inadequate. What he 
means by it is simply Jesus’ way of living, which we are to try to 
duplicate in our lives. That is, Christ is simply our Example. 
Of course, that is a part of the Christian religion; but it is far 
from all of it, and is not even its major note. According to the 
Gospels themselves to which Dr. Fosdick professes to appeal, the 
religion of Jesus includes much more than His beautiful 
example. Dr. Fosdick has left out the note of redemption, which 
is the cardinal element in the Christian religion. Why did 
Christ come into the world? Note Luke 1:21 (the angel’s 
anouncement to Joseph): “And she (Mary) shall bring forth a 
son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus; for he shall save his 
people from their sins.” Again ( Jesus’ own words): “For the 
Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost” 
(Luke 19:10) ; “For this is my blood of the New Testament, 
which is shed for many for the remission of sins’ (Mat. 26:28) ; 
“For the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to 
minister, and to give his life a ransom for many” (Matt. 
28:28) ; “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; he 
that believeth not shall be condemned” (Luke 16:16). It is 
likely that our Lord’s apostles understood Christ’s errand here 
on earth, is it not? Well, all of them teach that his primary 
purpose was to save people from sin and bring them back into 
holy fellowship with God. “This is a faithful saying, and 
worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world 
to save sinners” (1 Tim. 1: 15). 

Therefore Fosdick’s interpretation of the religion of Jesus is 
one-sided and defective; indeed, it omits the basic element, the 
element of redemption from sin. Is not his gospel, therefore, 
“another gospel” ? 

Moreover, Christ taught explicitly that every one must “‘be 
born again” (or “born from above’’), in order to see the king- 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 41 


dom of God. Where is the note of regeneration struck in our 
Modernist’s humanly devised scheme of the gospel? Is it pos- 
sible for unregenerate men to follow the example of Christ—to 
re-live his life of spiritual fellowship with God? 

Another inconsistency appears in Dr. Fosdick’s sermon. He 
declares that his brand of religion centers in the Gospels; and - 
yet in almost the same breath he condemns what he calls “a 
religion about Jesus’—namely, “theories of his pre-existence, 
birth, miracles, resurrection and return; philosophies about his 
personality, his metaphysical relationship with God, his atone- 
ment on the cross, and his presence in the sacraments.” 

Now, it may be that Dr. Fosdick will strain the words 
“theories” and “philosophies,” in the foregoing quotation; but 
if he does, that will simply prove his equivocal way of putting 
things. One thing is sure: the Gospels, in which he professes to 
center his religion, plainly teach the very. doctrines he says 
he repudiates, namely, Christ’s “pre-existence, virgin birth, 
miracles, resurrection, visible return,’ etc. Is Dr. Fosdick a 
consistent and logical thinker? 


Was Christ a Christian? 


Our Modernist accuses a Fundamentalist (unnamed) of say- 
ing, “Jesus himself was not a Christian!” And this he denounces 
as “another kind of religion altogether.” 

But is not that mere captiousness? In all the centuries of 
Christian history, the term “Christian” has meant a believer in 
and a follower of Jesus Christ. But how could Christ have 
been a follower of Himself? How could he have trusted in 
himself for his salvation, as all true Christians must do? There- 
fore, according to the ordinary and historical meaning of the 
term, our Lord could not have been a Christian, for that would 
have made him originally a sinner saved by himself. Surely a 
logical mind ought to be able to see that a sinner could not save 
a sinner. 

However, Dr. Fosdick, in common with the Modernists gen- 
erally, is trying to import into the term “Christian” another 


42 The Doctrines of Modernism 


sense than its historical sense; namely, any one who lives a good, 
pure life in fellowship with God. In that sense, of course, Jesus 
was a Christian, and the only absolutely perfect Christian; for 
he, and he alone, lived the perfect life. But it is this warping 
and twisting of the historical meaning of Christian terms by 
the Modernists that is so confusing and therefore so wrong. 

Dr. Fosdick speaks of a “new religious reformation” being 
afoot. He says it may split the Protestant church, just as there 
was a departure from the Catholic Church in the time of the 
Lutheran Reformation. And he implies that the Modernists 
are the reformers of our day as Luther and others were the 
reformers in their day. In this again, Dr. Fosdick is warping 
historical data. ‘There is about as much similarity between 
Modernism and the Reformation of the sixteenth century as 
there is between midnight and midday. The modernistic move- 
ment is a departure from the Word of God; the Protestant 
Reformation was a return to the Word of God. It is becoming 
wearisome to note the posing of the Modernists as reformers of 
the type of the heroes of the Reformation. Their real progenitors 
are the rationalists of all the centuries, whose vogue always has 
been to make human reason and feeling, instead of the Word 
of God, the standard of faith and practice. 


A Notable Farewell Service 


No doubt it was an impressive and affecting service—Dr. 
Fosdick’s farewell at the First Presbyterian Church of New 
York City. It had all the accessories to make it so. The Fosdick 
case has become notorious and sensational, and of course 
attracted a large crowd, as will always be the case on such an 
occasion. Moreover, Dr. Fosdick is a man of fine presence, 
oratorical power and magnetic force. He is able to charm by 
his gift of speech. 

It must also be admitted that he improved the opportunity 
to bring himself to the fore. He did not shrink back mod- 
estly and humbly, but thrust himself and his case into the 
foreground, so that his own personality was the center of 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 43 


attraction. In spite of several disclaimers, he made himself 
the hero of the occasion. 

There is one part of his sermon that was truly impressive— 
his appeal to young people and others who had not definitely 
decided to live the Christian life. At this point he spoke with 
evangelistic fervor. And his entreaties may have had a salutary 
effect. Of course, even this appeal lacked the full tonality of 
the Gospel message; for he said nothing about the unconverted 
coming to Christ for salvation from sin and for the gift of the 
new birth. These major notes—the redemptive notes—are con- 
spicuously absent from Dr. Fosdick’s preaching and writing. 
But nevertheless, his appeal for decision in favor of Christ was 
a strong one. 

Not for a moment would we want our readers to think us 
unwilling and unable to appreciate the good things in this 
sermon. The trouble, however, is that the faults bulk so 
largely and so sadly as to nullify the things that are true and 
render them practically ineffective, especially among people who 
stop to think and analyze. So let us go through the service and 
sermon, and kindly note some of the defects that marred them. 

First, the choir sang “Dr. Fosdick’s favorite anthems,” one 
of which was, “Hark, Hark, My Soul, Angelic Songs are 
Swelling.” It is a beautiful and moving piece of music. But 
the inconsistency of its use on this occasion lies in the fact that 
Dr. Fosdick does not believe in angels, or at least he is very 
dubious about their existence and ministry. Nothing else can 
be made of what he says in his book, “The Modern Use of the 
Bible” (pp. 43, 53, 123-129, 173, 220). The congregation also 
sang, ‘‘Faith of our fathers, holy faith, we will be true to thee 
till death.” Dr. Fosdick, however, has not been preaching “‘the 
faith of our fathers,’ but quite a different doctrine. Let any- 
body read his last book and see how many of the Biblical and 
creedal “categories” of our fathers he rejects. Why was music 
of this orthodox character used in a service in which the 
preacher proclaimed himself a “heretic,” saying boldly, “I am 
proud of it.” Does that sound much like the “faith of our 


44 The Doctrines of Modernism 


fathers” ? Our fathers were evangelical to the core. With might 
and main they would have resented the charge of heresy. 

For his text Dr. Fosdick used the narrative of Paul’s farewell 
to the Corinthian church (Acts 18:18). From both a her- 
meneutical and homiletical viewpoint he misused the text. This 
verse simply says that Paul “took leave of the brethren.” It 
says nothing of its being a formal farewell service. No hint is 
given of what Paul said on that occasion. Dr. Fosdick used the 
passage more as a pretext than as a text. With his imagination 
he supplied what he supposed Paul must have said at that 
farewell meeting, and that, of course, agreed precisely with what 
Fosdick wanted to say at Ais farewell service. Nobody knows 
what Paul said, for the history does not give even the remotest 
hint. Such a use of the imagination in a sermon, professedly 
based on Holy Scripture, is hardly justifiable. 

Calling upon his fertile fancy, Dr. Fosdick. felt sure, he said, 
that Paul must have talked to his Corinthian brethren about the 
things for which he had stood in the controversies through 
which he had passed at Corinth. This gave our preacher a pre- 
text for launching into a discussion of his own troubles. Do 
you see how he handled his text to fit it to his purpose? That is 
not obeying the Pauline injunction: ‘‘Study to show thyself 
approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, 
rightly dividing the word of truth” (2 Tim. 2:15). A much 
more appropriate text for a farewell service in an evangelical 
church would be Acts 20:28-32, which describes Paul’s last 
interview with the elders of Ephesus, a part of which we quote: 
“Take heed unto yourselves, and to all the flock, in which the 
Holy Spirit hath made you bishops, to feed the church of the 
Lord which He purchased with His own blood .. . And now 
I commend you to God and to the Word of His grace, which is 
able to build you up, and to give you the inheritance among all 
them that are sanctified.” Here would have been found some 
of the actual teachings of Paul, which might have been used in 
a truly homiletical way without any guessing as to what he 
may have said. However, Dr. Fosdick was compelled by his 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 45 


theories to fight shy of this text, because it refers to the blood 
atonement of Christ (verse 28) and to the Word of God as the 
source of edification and hope (verse 32). Many texts of the 
Bible, and those among the most precious and fundamental, 
too, must be very embarrassing to the Modernist. Attention is 
called to Gal. 3:13; 2 Cor. 5:21;.2 ‘Tim.:3:14-17; 1 Pet. 
1318-213 2'Pet..1::20, 21. 

Dr. Fosdick throughout his sermon compared himself with 
Paul. He was Paul, while his critics, the Fundamentalists, 
were the false Judaizing teachers. Paul stood firmly for Christ; 
so does Fosdick! The Judaizing teachers corrupted the teaching 
of Christ by the impedimenta of Judaism, like circumcision and 
the keeping of the ceremonial law; so do the Fundamentalists! 
What do our readers think of such warping and twisting of 
Scriptures? Paul was the heretic of that age; Fosdick is the 
heretic of this age! These are marvelous comparisons! ‘The 
trouble is, they are not true. As the scientists say of Haeckel’s 
“doctored-up” pictures of human embryos, they are “‘schema- 
tized,” 

We must make note of some more of our preacher’s paral- 
lelisms. He says that the Jewish disturbers at Corinth were 
“the first Fundamentalists of the Christian movement.” ‘This 
implies that the present-day Fundamentalists are their theo- 
logical descendants, whereas Fosdick compares himself to the 
great and heroic Paul! 

But what doctrines did Paul’s opponents hold? Says Fosdick: 
“Tt never dawned on them to abate one jot or tittle of their 
emphasis upon the old observances—circumcision, clean and un- 
clean foods, Sabbath observance, and the temple ritual and 
sacrifice.” 

Now, do any of the Fundamentalists today hold those old 
Jewish doctrines and practices? Every child ought to know they 
do not. Are they going around and preaching that people must 
become Jews and must be circumcised before they can become 
Christians? You know they are not. Dr. Fosdick knows they 
are not. 


46 The Doctrines of Modernism 


Moreover, he either knows or ought to know that his 
opponents hold and teach the full Pauline body of doctrine, 
and especially the doctrines of justification by faith, salvation by 
grace, the efficacy of Christ’s expiatory sacrifice on the cross, the 
physical resurrection of Christ, the resurrection of all men at the 
last day, and the final coming of our Lord in visible form to 
judge the quick and the dead. Thus Dr. Fosdick’s assumed 
parallelism between his opponents and the old Judaizing teachers 
is simply a concoction of his own imagination. 

But what is to be said about his assumed likeness to Paul? 
“The real Paul,” he avers, “was a determined heretic.”’ Of the 
same order Fosdick declares himself to be. Let us note, then, 
whether there is any vital resemblance between the apostle and 
our Modernist. Perhaps we will find more differences than 
similarities. Paul believed in Adam and the Adamic sin (Rom. 
5:14-21; 1 Cor. 15:22, 45; 1 Tim. 2:13); Fosdick does not. 
Paul believed in angels (2 Thess. 1:7; 1-Tim. 3:16; Col. 
2:18) ; Fosdick does not. Paul believed in demons (Acts 16:18, 
19:12; 1 Cor. 10:20) ; Fosdick does not (see his book, pp. 43, 
45, 129, etc.). Paul believed in Christ’s expiatory atonement 
(Rom. 3:25, 26, and many other passages) ; Fosdick denies it. 
Paul believed in redemption through the blood of Christ (Eph. 
1:7; Col. 1:20); Fosdick never mentions the shedding of 
Jesus’ blood for the remission of sins. Paul believed in the 
resurrection of the body of Christ and of the bodies of His 
saints; Fosdick puts this doctrine among the “outmoded cate- 
gories.” Paul insisted on the visible return of Christ upon the 
earth; Fosdick rejects that doctrine. 

Yes, there is little similarity between Paul and Fosdick. On 
the other hand, those whom Fosdick laughs at as Fundamental- 
ists and scorns as narrow and intolerant, heartily accept all the 
doctrines which Paul taught and reject, ex animo, all the 
errors he rejected, including the false teaching of the Judaizers. 
It would seem that our Modernist has strange ideas of paral- 
lelisms. He seems to be able to find them where they do not 
exist. We leave all fair-minded people to judge whether it is 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 47 


right for any one, in dealing with sacred things, to give such 
loose rein to his imagination. 

“They call me a heretic. I am proud of it. I wouldn’t live in 
a generation like this and be anything but a heretic.” So boasted 
our Modernist.. The trouble here is again, as has been shown so 
often, he uses words in a wrong sense. He wrenches them from 
their historical meaning, and forces into them a content of his 
own. For instance, he puts Paul, Knox and Calvin into the class 
of heretics. In other places in his writings he calls Luther by the 
same term. But who was it that called Paul a heretic? It was 
the persecuting Jews (Acts 24:14). No Christians ever called 
him by that name. So in this respect Fosdick aligns himself 
with the malevolent Jews, who were hounding and misrepre- 
senting the apostle. Paul himself condemned heretics: ‘For 
there must be also heresies among yuu, that they which are 
approved may be made manifest among you” (1 Cor. 11:19). 
It would have been better for Dr. Fosdick to have studied Paul 
a little more thoroughly before he likened himself to him. Paul 
rebukes and condemns heresy in several passages. Consult a 
Bible concordance or text-book. Read Titus 3:10. “A man that 
is a heretic, after the first and second admonition reject.” Thus 
Paul’s idea of heretics and Fosdick’s do not agree. Fosdick chose 
the wrong text. He should have selected 1 Cor. 11:19 or 
Titus 3:10. 

Again, who applied the term heretic to Luther, Calvin and 
Knox? The persecuting Roman Catholics. No true Protestant 
ever called them by that opprobrious title. So in this regard 
Dr. Fosdick joins the Romanists against the Protestants. And 
why were these reformers persecuted? In every case it was 
because they wanted to bring the people back to the Bible as the 
infallible authority in matters of faith and practice. And that is 
precisely what the opponents of Dr. Fosdick want to do today; 
and it is precisely what he does not want to have done. Here 
again the Fundamentalists are very much like the reformers, 
while Fosdick is very much unlike them. Did Luther, Calvin 
and Knox ever reject the ‘“‘categories” of the Bible? Did they 


48 The Doctrines of Modernism 


ever declare that they did not believe in “‘fiat creation,” or the 
resurrection of the body, or the virgin birth, or the substitutional 
atonement, or the visible record coming of Christ? No; they 
accepted the plenary faith of the gospel. Fosdick shreds the 
gospel, rejecting what he does not fancy, accepting only what he 
pleases. 

Thus our friend is constantly putting himself in the wrong 
company. He calls orthodox men heretics because Jews and 
Roman Catholics dubbed them in that way, and classifies him- 
self according to such superficial data. 

In the historical sense of the term, who are the men who are 
known as heretics? Here are the most outstanding names: 
Marcion, and the other Gnostics, the Ebionites, the Docetists, 
the Novatians, Apollinaris, Nestorius, Arius, Pelagius, Socinus 
(Faustus and Laelius), Abelard, etc. All these men took a 
liberalistic attitude toward the Holy Scriptures and toned down 
and shredded the plenary doctrines. We want to be kind, but 
frankness compels us to say that the Modernists of our day bear 
a much closer resemblance to these men than they do to such 
staunchly orthodox teachers and reformers as Luther, Calvin 
and Knox. 

It would have been better if Dr. Fosdick had consulted the 
dictionary to find his definition of a heretic, instead of manufac- 
turing one out of his subjective imagination. ‘This is Webster’s 
definition of a heretic: “One who, having made a profession of 
Christian belief, deliberately and pertinaciously upholds a doc- 
trine varying from that of his church, or rejects one prescribed 
by his church.” That is the true definition of a heretic. Note 
how accurately it describes our Modernist. 

Strangely enough, Dr. Fosdick complains that “outsiders” 
have made the trouble between him and the First Presbyterian 
Church. Here again he does not think and reason in a straight 
line. Can the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, 
of which the First Church is an organic member and part, be - 
properly called an “outsider”? Has an ecclesiastical body no 
jurisdiction over the churches that have voluntarily become 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 49 


members of it? If not, what is the use of having such a body? 
What is the use of any organization whatever if it has no 
power to insist on the observance of its constitutional rules and 
principles ? 

In this case, then, who is the real “outsider”? Is it not Dr. 
Fosdick himself? He is not even a member of the Presbyterian 
Church; he belongs to the Northern Baptist Church. Court- 
eously invited by the General Assembly to become a minister of 
that body, he declined, and this he did on the ground that he 
could not conscientiously accept the standards of the Presbyter- 
ian Church! Was there ever a more anomalous situation in the 
history of the Christian church? And in a Presbyterian pulpit 
he persistently preached doctrines that were designed to sap 
the very foundations of that denomination! Yet he, the real 
“outsider,” accuses the people actually within the Presbyterian 
fold of being “outsiders,” and thereby intimates that they were 
meddlers! Nor has he any solid and adequate ideas of ecclesias- 
tical discipline, regularity and authority. Indeed, he seems to 
want to be a law unto himself, and that principle would, we 
greatly fear, ultimately lead to lawlessness and disruption in 


both Church and State. 


The Doctrine of God 


We confess to being somewhat in a quandary regarding Dr. 
Fosdick’s conception of God. One of our best and keenest 
friends looks upon him as a pantheist or a near-pantheist. This 
confusion arises, we are persuaded, because Dr. Fosdick is not 
always consistent in his modes of expression. Let us note a 
few sample passages in his book. 

After quoting approvingly from Professor J. H. Poynting, 
a prominent scientist, Dr. Fosdick says (p. 159): “Surely such 
descriptive formulas do not shut out vital belief in a provident 
and active God. To modern Christian thought what we call 
laws are our partial plottings of the ways in which creative 
spirit acts.” “Then he goes on to illustrate (p. 160) his doctrine 
from the activities of men in connection with natural law, the 


50 The Doctrines of Modernism 


implication being that God also can and does act in a personal 
way in and through His laws. This would seem to imply that 
God is a Person, even a free Person, and that would hardly 
spell pantheism. 

Note again (p. 161): “If, therefore, we were to consider 
God in the most anthropomorphic way, we should have to 
credit Him with freedom to create and control at least as much 
as we can. And when we enlarge our thought of God, see Him 
as the ideal-realizing Capacity in the universe or the creative 
Spirit at the heart of it, what we call laws may be standardiza- 
tions of His activity, but certainly not limitations of it.” 
These excerpts seem to imply personality in God. A good many 
kindred passages might be cited. 

In a number of places our author speaks of God as “‘coming 
into” the world. For example: ‘‘For Christianity is the relig- 
ion of incarnation, and its central affirmation is that God can 
come into human life” (p. 263; see also-pp. 243 and 249). 
This would seem to connote that God is transcendent. If He 
were not, such an expression as ‘““His coming into human life” 
would have no meaning. 

And yet one cannot be sure. Our author seems to be afraid 
to assert the divine transcendence. In three places where 
he uses the word (pp. 123, 140 and 243) he seems to dis- 
parage it; and, worst of all, sets the divine immanence over 
against it. Now, the true theist, especially the Christian theist, 
would emphasize both the transcendence and the immanence 
of God, and would never think of setting them in opposition. 
This is the clear Biblical teaching: God is greater than the 
universe, that is, transcends it; therefore He is able to be per- 
sonally omnipresent in it. The trouble with Dr. Fosdick is, he 
so persistently stresses the divine immanence as to lead people 
to suspect him of at least pantheistic leanings, even if he is not 
thorough-going and consistent in his views. 

There are several expressions that apparently strike the pan- 
theistic note. Here is a quotation from Carlyle which our 
author approves (p. 265): “Or what is Nature? Ha! why do I 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 51 


not name thee God? ‘Art thou not the living garment of God ?’ 
O Heavens, is it, in very deed, He, then, that ever speaks 
through thee; that lives and loves in thee, that lives and loves in 
me?” Another quotation from Sir Oliver Lodge: “We are no 
aliens in a stranger universe governed by an outside God; we 
are parts of a developing whole, all enfolded in an embracing 
and interpenetrating love, of which we too, each to other, 
sometimes experience the joy too deep for words.” These cita- 
tions are at least compromisingly pantheistic—although it must 
be said, when you come to analyze them, that they seem to 
waver between pantheism and theism. 

We give two quotations directly from Dr. Fosdick to show 
how near the pantheistic borderline he treads: “In our theology 
no longer are the divine and human like oil and water that can- 
not mix; rather, all the best in us is God in us.” If Dr. Fos- 
dick means that the divine and the human “mix” in such a way 
as to form a ¢ertium quid, he is teaching pantheism. If he does 
not want to be classed with pantheists, he should not use 
their lingo, such as the word “mix.” Again Dr. Fosdick says (p. 
267): ‘“The presupposition of all our thinking is the conviction, 
not that there is a vast difference between God and man, but 
that God and man belong together and in each other are 
fulfilled.” 

What does that mean? Is it symptomatic of pantheistic 
notions? In these days of boasting modern scholarship a clear 
thinker should not leave his readers in confusion. The best 
we can say, the Modernist himself being witness, is that he is 
neither a consistent theist nor a consistent pantheist. Is 
he, therefore, a safe leader in thought and a safe guide in 
religion? 

In a recent address, which the writer had the opportunity of 
hearing, Dr. Fosdick declaimed against the doctrine of “fiat 
creation.” “This is a living, evolving universe,’ he said. Such 
patois also has a pantheistic jingle to it. By denouncing “fiat 
creation” he means that God did not bring anything into being 
by a divine command, All the expressions, “And God said, 


ae The Doctrines of Modernism 


Let there be light,” etc., in the first chapter of Genesis, are 
to be classed with the “outmoded categories.” But how did the 
universe come into existence if not by the will and act and 
decree of the Almighty? Is the universe eternal? If Dr. Fos- 
dick holds to the latter doctrine, then Dr. Fosdick is tacitly, if 
not avowedly, a pantheist; for, as far as we can see, there is no 
middle or intermediate ground between pantheism and theism. 

In the “‘crusade,” as he calls it, which, at the present writing, 
he is carrying on in this country, he is making another serious 
mistake and thereby doing harm. He represents the various 
Christian denominations as so many warring sects. This delinea- 
tion is not true. There is at the present time very little contro- 
versy or wrangling among the various denominations. Here 
and there you may find some petty local jealousies, but the great 
branches of the church are, as a rule, working amicably side by 
side, and most of them have been doing so for many years. In 
almost every city there is an inter-denominational ministerial 
association and has been one for a long time. Throughout all 
his pastoral life—and that began quite a number of years ago— 
the writer of these lines belonged to such organizations, and 
always found them working together in harmony (except in one 
case where a Modernist broke in with his divisive criticism of 
Holy Writ). 

No; the Christian denominations are not engaged in any 
serious controversy today. Many of them can come together 
in conferences and sing heartily, ““We are not divided; all one 
body we.” The only serious controversy in the American 
Protestant church today is the one that has been stirred by the 
Modernists and the rationalistic Biblical critics. 

Another harmful error that our liberalist is committing in 
his present “crusade” is this: He pronounces many drastic 
criticisms upon Christianity, and thus gives encouragement to 
the infidels of the land, who, in their papers and addresses, 
applaud his attacks and make the most of them for their own’ 
propaganda of destruction. Why do the Modernists put a club 
into the hands of the foes of the Christian faith? 


A Modernist’s View of the Bible 53 


Again, is it not a mark of superficial and errant thinking 
for Dr. Fosdick to say that “Christianity must be reformed” ? 
What is Christianity? It is that perfect system of redemption 
which God has devised for human weal and which has been 
revealed in His holy Word? How then can it be reformed? It 
surely would be more to the point to say that the people of the 
world should be reformed by Christianity, which is the power 
of God unto salvation to every one that believeth. Dr. Fosdick 
should use terms precisely. It is Christendom, not Christianity, 
which needs to be improved, if not reformed, and especially the 
people who have so sadly apostatized from the evangelical faith. 
Acquaintance with the facts of history will convince anybody 
that in the past every true reformation in the church has been 
accomplished by a return to the pure Word of God, not by a 
departure therefrom. “Therefore the Modernists who claim 
to be reformers are on the wrong trail. 

A salient editorial appeared in a recent number of The 
Lutheran, the official organ of the United Lutheran Church in 
America. The writer says: 

“Naturally Christians who hold to the Bible as to a safe 
and sure anchorage, will resent any effort to undermine 
the people’s faith in it as the full and final authority to decide 
what is to be believed. If some have misrepresented the lib- 
eralist’s position, it can be said with equal truth that the latter 
has paid him back in his own coin with compound interest. 
If the latter has made the former’s position look dangerous, 
the former has made the latter’s position look ridiculous. 
Thus the liberalist who longs for Christian unity and has 
a contempt for denominationalism, has started a controversy 
that makes unity impossible and denominationalism _re- 
spectable and honorable. On a creed such as he has to offer, 
there will be no Christian unity on this narrow isthmus of time 
that lies between two eternities.” 

That is well said. We desire simply to add that the rent that 
the purveyors of Modernism have made in the Christian church 
is a thousand times more serious and harmful than her division 


54 The Doctrines of Modernism 


into evangelical branches, which have been and are today work- 
ing together in comparative unity. 

To show the sad length and departures to which liberalism, 
when pushed to its logical conclusion, will lead men, a concrete 
case is here cited. Our reference is to Dr. W. B. Selbie, 
Principal of Mansfield College, Oxford, a well-known writer 
and Doctor of Divinity, some of whose books are being exploited 
in this country. Note some things he says in a recent book, ‘““Ihe 
Psychology of Religion.”’ He rejects the concept of the miracu- 
lous and supernatural by making God immanent in natural 
law (p. 196). He avers that “‘Paul’s ideas of predestination and 
election are now repudiated by the general moral sense of man- 
kind” (p. 240). He declares that “the phenomena of Pentecost” 
are only one among many examples of “spiritual excitation,” 
which has “many parallels in the religious and initiation 
practices of primitive and savage peoples” (p. 204). 

Think of the last citation for a moment—putting the holy 
event of Pentecost, the time of the outpouring of the Holy 
Spirit upon the apostles, according to the promise of Jesus 
Christ, into the same class as the superstitious rites of primitive 
people still in the savage state! Truly this Modernistic spirit 
seems more and more to be losing the sense of reverence for 
divine things. 


CHAPTER II 


MOFFATT’S TRANSLATION OF THE 
OLD TESTAMENT 


OME time ago, Dr. James Moffatt published a trans- 
Sy lation of the New Testament into the modern vernacular. 

It has received much attention, and for several reasons: 
First, people are interested in reading the Bible in the language 
of the day; second, they want to know whether the Bible has 
come down to us in its integrity through all the ages; third, 
they desire light on certain obscure passages that may be made 
plain by a skillful translator; fourth, Dr. Moffatt is known as 
a liberalist in Biblical criticism—a fact that stirs curiosity as to 
his treatment of certain crucial passages of Holy Writ. 

He has now issued a translation of the Old Testament. This 
recension is likely to attract wide attention. Many people will 
be curious to know how Dr. Moffatt handles the Old Testa- 
ment text, especially certain passages which are fundamental in 
the present conflict in the church. Further on, we shall venture 
to pass some rather trenchant criticisms on this so-called trans- 
lation, which might more accurately be styled a paraphrastic 
interpretation, since Dr. Moffatt has in many places handled 
the Bible in the interest of his subjective conceptions. 

No special objection need be made, we think, to putting the 
Bible in modern language. In almost every historic translation 
this has been done. Luther translated the Bible into the com- 
mon language of the people of his day, although he reverently 
made use of the more solemn forms of speech. The same is true 
of the King James translation, which many people still prefer 
to all other translations made into the English tongue. So also 

55 


56 The Doctrines of Modernism 


the revised versions are all an attempt to modernize the lan- 
guage of the Bible, to make it more appealing to the people of 
our times, and to rid it of archaic forms which are not always 
clear to modern folk. So we do not raise any objection per se to 
Dr. Moffatt’s attempt to put the Bible into our present-day 
vernacular.* 

So far as we can perceive, Dr. Moffatt has the adequate 
scholastic equipment for the work he has undertaken. Evidently 
he is conversant with the Hebrew, and is able to compare it with 
the cognate Semitic languages wherever they throw light upon 
the text. He has obviously spent much time and work on this 
production. His assiduity and painstaking efforts are deserving 
of commendation. 

There is no doubt, too, that he has illumined more than one 
obscure passage of Scripture, where other translators either did 
not succeed or else made too slavish a translation. Everybody 
must admit that each language has its idiématic forms, which 
may be clear to those who use that language, but which cannot 
be literally transferred to any other language. The expertness 
of the translator consists in being able to give the real sense of 
such idioms, or to find their exact equivalent in the language of 
the translation. In this respect, Dr. Moffatt has succeeded in 
many cases to a gratifying degree. 

Most sincerely do we wish that we could give Dr. Moffatt’s 
work our hearty endorsement. It is not pleasant to criticise. 
Our heart grows sad to think what a great contribution he 
might have made to the cause of Christian truth, had he 
possessed the truly evangelical temper, and had given the world 
a Close but idiomatic translation of the Bible just as it is, without 
in any way “doctoring it up.” However, apparently he could 
not lay aside his subjective biases and give a purely detached 
translation of God’s Word. We are compelled, therefore, in the 
interest of truth, to point out a number of places where he has 
manipulated the Hebrew text in a way that cannot be justified. 


“We have, however, read some keen criticisms on his English, and on his 
use of forms of speech that are lacking in dignity, if not in reverence. 


Moffatt’s Translation of the Old Testament 57 


Examples of the Graf-Wellhausen Criticism 


It surprises us not a little that our author so often mishandles 
the Hebrew text in the interest of the above-named rationalistic 
criticism. Apparently he accepts out-of-hand the so-called 
“assured results” of this old and discredited dissecting process. 
According to his view, the Pentateuch is made up of various 
strands or documents which, in agreement with the traditional 
critical method, are called J, E, D, P, etc. In many places he 
prints the J portions in italics. Genesis 2: 4b to 4:19 is printed 
thus, to indicate that it was written by the Jehovistic scribe. 
Then Gen. 3:20 and 21 are printed in Roman letters, and are 
enclosed in double brackets, to show that the passage is an edi- 
torial addition or a later interpolation. ‘The italics begin again 
at 3:22, and carry over to 4:26. The whole of the fifth 
chapter is attributed to the J writer; then 6:18 is ascribed to E; 
at that point J breaks in again and finishes the chapter. Chapter 
7 is broken into rather small bits by this process. Verse 10 is 
placed before verses 7, 8 and 9, and verse 16 is placed before 
verse 12, the latter verse being sandwiched between verses 16 
and 17. Verses 1-5 are assigned to E; while verse 6 is sup- 
posed to belong to J, and verse 7 to E. Verses 16 and 17 are 
actually divided between two documents, part belonging to J 
and the rest to E. 

Thus Genesis is converted into a veritable patchwork, and 
many patches, some larger, some smaller, serve to bedizen the 
rest of the Pentateuch. 

What is to be said of this parcelling process? First, it is 
absurd to think that critics can dissect any piece of literature, 
ancient or modern, in this atomistic way. Take any known 
modern work of collaboration, and no man is able, with any 
degree of certainty, to say categorically just which sections were 
written by one author and which by another. The experiment 
has been tried again and again, and in every case has proved a 
failure. Even within the past few months, the literary editors 
of The Forum failed to identify the author of a prize story. 


58 The Doctrines of Modernism 


They found their judgment utterly at fault. The author of the 
successful story was not the author whom they had guessed 
him to be. When will the dissecting critics of the Bible learn 
this simple truth? 

What right, therefore, has Dr. Moffatt to manipulate the 
Bible in the way he does when the results of his process are so 
far from assured? No man today is justified in taking these 
guesses of the critics for granted. We kindly raise the question 
whether it is ethical to represent them in a professed transla- 
tion of the Bible as if they were all settled. The aflomb of the 
radical critics is naive, not scientific. 

In the next place, Dr. Moffatt ignores the works of all the 
great scholars of the conservative school who have again and 
again shown how impossible are the critical theories of the 
radicals. How could he do this? Has he done it purposely? 
If so, was it fair, frank and honest? If he knows nothing about 
these conservative works, what is to be said of “scholarship” of 
so one-sided a type? Long ago, men like Robertson (of Glas- 
gow), Orr, Cave, Green, Bartlett, Bissell and McKim showed 
the absurdity and illogical character of the documentary theory. 
Has not Dr. Moffatt read their works? If he has, how can he 
be so sure that one school of critics are absolutely right and the 
other school absolutely wrong? Then, too, is not Dr. Moffatt 
aware of the existence and scholarly works of men living to-day, 
like Koenig, Wace, Fitchett, Finn, Naville, Wilson and Kyle? 
If he is, he has no moral right to give to innocent people a 
professed translation of the Bible on the basis of the dissecting 
criticism, without letting them know that there are scholars 
who call in question its conclusions. This is the fault of men 
like Moffatt, we regret to say—they simply ignore their oppo- 
nents. 

We must protest against the imposition of a so-called 
translation of the Bible on the Christian public on the basis of 
the unproved speculations of the shredding critics. We hold that © 
a work which utterly ignores conservative scholarship is itself 
unscholarly. 


Moffatt’s Translation of the Old Testament 59 


Tampering With the Hebrew Text 


No man has a right to advertise a version of the Bible as a 
translation if he tampers with the sacred text. Where the 
Hebrew is somewhat obscure or imperfect, he should make it 
as clear as possible. In such cases he should frankly admit that 
he has done the best he could to clarify the difficulty, but that 
he by no means offers his suggestions in a dogmatic way. That 
is something very different, however, from manipulating the 
text where it is lucid in the original, and doing it in the interest 
of his own subjective views. Sincerely do we interrogate the 
ethics of such a procedure. The text should be dealt with as it 
is. Let it speak for itself. Let the people judge for themselves 
whether or not it furnishes grounds for belief in the docu- 
mentary and critical theories. Why not let the reader be the 
judge? 

If, after reading the translation of the Biblical text just 
as it has come down to us, there is clear evidence of a scissors- 
and-paste process of compiling, let the people see it for them- 
selves. But no translation of the Bible should be based on un- 
proved and unprovable hypotheses. So much in general. Let 
us now examine several specific cases. 


The Biblical Narrative of Creation 


How does the Hebrew text of the Bible begin its narrative? 
With the majestic statement: “In the beginning God created 
the heavens and the earth” (which is the literal translation of 
the Hebrew text). How does Dr. Moffatt begin his so-called 
translation? Thus: ‘This is the story of how the universe 
was formed. When God began to form the universe, the world 
was void and vacant.’ Compare the two statements, kindly 
reader. Do they agree? Do they express the same thought? Do 
they convey the same meaning? They surely do not. 

Let us analyze. Dr. Moffatt goes to Gen. 2:4a for his open- 
ing statement, wrenches it from its historic place, and transfers 
it to a position before Gen. 1:1, actually making it the initial 


60 The Doctrines of Modernism 


statement of the Bible! How can he do such violence to the 
Biblical text? There is not in the world to-day an authoritative 
Hebrew Bible that places Gen. 2:4a at its beginning; and, as 
far as any one knows, there never has been such a Hebrew 
Bible. More than that, every authentic Hebrew text inserts this 
verse in its well-known place in our common Bibles (Gen. 
2:4). It would seem to us that the divisive critics are assuming | 
a great responsibility in handling the Bible in the manner above 
indicated. 

Suppose, however, we employ a little reasoning. Dr. Moffatt 
assigns Gen. 2:4a to the writer E; while Gen. 2:4b and what 
follows he assigns to J. Now, how did E ever commit such a 
blunder as to let 2:4a slip from its place of primacy at the 
beginning of the creative narrative into the fourth verse of 
chapter 2? How could he have been so stupid? Oh! perhaps it 
was a “redactor.” Well, then, why did he commit that stupid 
blunder? If its logical place was before Gen. 1:1, why did 
he not keep it there? 

But more and worse follows. In the Hebrew text, Gen. 
2:4a reads: ‘““These are the generations of the heavens and the 
earth when they were created” (literally translated; so, too, 
the American Revised Version). But note how Moffatt puts it: 
‘This is the story of how the universe was formed.” Compare 
the two. “These” (plural) he translates “this” (singular). 
“Generations” (toledoth) he turns into “story” (singular). 
The verb for “created” (Hebrew, bara) he translates “formed,” 
which would require an entirely different Hebrew verb 
(yatsar). Is not that tampering with the text? Can it be 
characterized by a milder term? ‘The word “generations” 
surely does not mean “story.” Nor is the first chapter of 
Genesis a “‘story.”” Nowhere in the Bible is it treated as a 
“story.” It is treated as an historical narrative. But Dr. Mof- 
fatt styles it a “story.” Why? Because that idea comports with 
his Graf-Wellhausen theories. In other words, he does not’ 
accept the historicity of Genesis 1 and 2, but regards them as 
only myth or legend ; hence a ““story.’’ We cannot think that any 


Moffatts Translation of the Old Testament 61 


man is justified in treating the Bible in that way. It would not 
be right so to handle even a secular composition. 

We maintain that Gen. 2:4a occurs in its precise logical place 
in the Hebrew text. The whole verse indicates the beginning of 
a new series of events, namely, those that took place subsequent 
to the creation of the heavens and the earth. If the first chapter 
of our modern versions of the Bible would end with verse 3 of 
the second chapter, and the second chapter would begin with 
verse 4, the sense of the narrative would be much clearer. 
Then it could be seen that a new theme begins. In the American 
Revised Version, verse 4, begins a new paragraph. At this point, 
too, the King James Version begins a new verse; so does 
Luther’s German translation. The Hebrew Bible, lying before 
us as we write, also makes a new paragraph at the beginning of 
verse 4. In spite of all this consensus of scholarship, Dr. Moffatt 
wrests verse 4a from its historical position, and puts it at the 
very beginning of the Bible! 

Here we quote pertinently from that great Hebrew scholar 
and exegete, Dr. C. F. Keil (page 71 of his commentary on 
Genesis) : “Just as the toledoth of Noah, for example, does not 
mention his birth, but contains his history and the birth of his 
sons; so the toledoth of the heavens and the earth do not de- 
scribe the origin of the universe, but what happened to the 
heavens and the earth after their creation.”” Why did not Dr. 
Moffatt give heed to this great Hebraist, who supports his 
position by many cogent arguments? 


Our Critic’s Idea of Creation 


It pains us to have to say that our author misuses the Hebrew 
text in dealing with the doctrine of creation. Taking such 
liberties with the Bible is certainly serious. “The Hebrew text 
says plainly (Gen. 1:1): “In the beginning God created (dara) 
the heavens and the earth.” Here we have a complete sentence 
and a positive declaration. It surely must mean just what it 
says. But Dr. Moffatt changes this positive declarative sentence 
into a greatly weakened subordinate clause. This is his pro- 


62 The Doctrines of Modernism 


fessed “translation” of the first sentence of the Holy Bible: 
“When God began to form the universe.” Compare it with 
what the Bible actually says (Hebrew text literally translated) : 
“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” Yet 
the author had the Hebrew text right before him, for he con- 
tends in his preface that he always went back to the original. 
Why did he change the first sentence of the Bible into a sub- 
ordinate clause? And why did he excise from it all idea of 
creation? 

It is an error to translate the Hebrew verb bara (to create) 
by the English word “form.” It does not mean merely to form 
or fashion. There are other Hebrew words to express that 
thought. The verb Jara means to bring something new into 
existence. In such contexts as Gen. 1: 1 and 27, it means to 
produce something ex nihilo. In almost every Biblical passage 
where it occurs, it means either the outright creation of a new 
entity or the injection of a new force or quality that can be 
attributed only to God. It was wrong, therefore, for Dr. Mof- 
fatt to empty the word of its true meaning, which is “‘to create.” 

If Dr. Moffatt is correct, the Bible teaches nothing about the 
origin of the universe; nothing as to how its primordial material 
came into existence. The clause, “When God began to form 
the universe,” does not go back to a real beginning. It assumes 
that the material was already in existence, and that God only 
began to fashion it. “Then whence came the primordial material ? 
You see, this perversion of the Holy Scriptures robs mankind of 
the doctrine of creation, and leaves the question of origins in 
fogland. 

And why this mishandling of the Word of God? The reason 
is plain. ‘The author does not believe in the doctrine of divine 
creation. He thinks that matter is eternal; evidently holding to 
the old doctrine of Plato and Aristotle and the ancient heresy 
of the Gnostics and Manicheans, who taught that God was 
not the Creator, but only an artificer. So he twisted the 
language of the Bible in the interest of his own unscriptural 
philosophy. 


Moffati’s Translation of the Old Testament 63 


In Gen. 1:27, he also translates the verb bara (create) by 
the weak verb, “form.” Note his handling of this classical pas- 
sage of the Christian ages: ‘So God formed man in his own 
likeness, in the likeness of God he formed him, male and female 
he formed both.’ (Italics ours.) 

Thus, according to Moffatt, man was not created in the 
divine image; he was only formed. Out of what was he formed? 
Obviously this wresting of the Hebrew text was done to make 
it agree with the theory of evolution. This is another example 
of what men will resort to when they become obsessed with that 
theory. Is it right? Even Dr. Charles Foster Kent, the author 
of ‘““The Shorter Bible,” and a most decided liberalist, did not 
have the temerity to tamper with the verb dara, but translated 
it “create” in Gen. 1: 1 and 27. 


The Bible Versus Moffatt on Species 


The Genetical account of the creation makes it plain that 
God created the various species of plants and animals to repro- 
duce “after their kind.” This phrase occurs in Gen. 1:11, 12, 
21, 24, 25. In several of these verses it occurs twice and in verse 
25 three times. 

But note Dr. Moffatt’s paraphrase (verse 12): ‘““The earth 
brought forth verdure, plants bearing seed of every kind and 
trees yielding fruit of every kind, fruit with seed in it.”’ (The 
italics are ours.) Verse 21: “So God formed the great sea- 
monster and every kind of living creature that moves, with 
which the waters teem, and every kind of winged bird.” Verse 
25: “God made every kind of wild beast, every kind of 
animal, and every kind of reptile; and God saw that it was 
good.” 

Now, we must beg to protest that the recurring phrase, 
“every kind,” is a mistranslation of the Hebrew text. Let us 
translate verse 12 as literally as possible: “And the earth 
brought forth grass (verdure), herb yielding seed after its 
(Heb., his) kind, and tree bearing fruit, in which is the seed of 
it, after its (his) kind; and God saw that it was good.” 


64 The Doctrines of Modernism 


In the Hebrew the phrase “after its kind” is represented by 
one word, which may be represented in English letters as fol- 
lows: le-min-hoo. The syllable Je is the Hebrew preposition 
“to” or “after;” the middle syllable is a noun meaning “kind” or 
“species”; the syllable hoo is a sufix and means “his” or “of 
him” (genitive of possession). The word therefore, means liter- 
ally ‘to his kind.” The suffix Je has various meanings according 
to the context in which it is used. Although its ordinary mean- 
ing is “‘to,” yet Roy’s Hebrew and English Dictionary translates 
it “after” and “according to.” Thus the Hebrew word le-min- 
hoo is properly translated “after its kind” or “according to 
its kind.” 

But in none of our authorities (and we have consulted a 
dozen or more) do we find /e translated “‘of,”’ as Moffatt trans- 
lates it. And, by the way, Charles Foster Kent, in his “The 
Shorter Bible,” also twists the Hebrew preposition, and para- 
phrases it by the phrase, “of every kind.” Thus these liberalists, 
instead of dealing accurately with the Hebrew text, read their 
own construction into it. 

The Hebrew word min means “kind” or “species.” So it is 
defined in our Hebrew and English Dictionary, referred to 
above. Keil in his critical commentary on Genesis and Young 
in his “Analytical Concordance” so define it. So do all our 
other authorities. The suffix hoo is the personal pronoun “his” 
or the genitive, “of him.” The proper literal translation, there- 
fore, is “after his kind,” or “after the kind of him,” or “‘accord- 
ing to his kind.” The reader need not be disturbed by the 
masculine form of the pronoun here, for in Hebrew, as in some 
other languages like the Greek, Latin and German, the gram- 
matical gender does not always correspond with differences of 
sex. When translating into our English idiom, therefore, we 
should put it, “according to its kind.” 

But Dr. Moffatt construes the Hebrew into saying, “of every 
kind.” Here are two errors: first, the preposition “of” does 
not agree with the Hebrew preposition Je; second, there is no 
word in the Hebrew text for “every.” We are led to suspect, 


Moffati’s Translation of the Old Testament 65 


therefore, that the words “of” and “every” have been injected 
in the interest of a subjective theory. 

The following are some of the versions and authorities that 
translate our phrase, “after its kind,” or in verse 21, 24 and 
25, where the plural form (le-men-ai-hem) occurs, ‘after their 
kind”: ‘The King James Version, the English and American 
Revised versions, the German Bible (ein Jegliches nach seiner 
Art), Moulton’s ‘“The Modern Reader’s Bible,” Roy’s ‘“He- 
brew and English Dictionary,” Keil’s ‘Commentary on 
Genesis,” Dummelow’s ‘““The One Volume Bible Commentary” 
(this author is quite liberal), Green’s ““The Unity of Genesis,” 
Bartlett’s “The Veracity of the Hexateuch,’ Young’s “Analy- 
tical Concordance” (which gives the Hebrew and Greek of 
each word treated), and, best of all, the Hebrew Bible itself. 

A critic may think that all this is “much ado about nothing.” 
What difference does it make, anyway, whether we say “of 
every kind” or “after its kind”? We reply, one difference is that 
the former is not the correct translation, and in these days it is 
most needful to be accurate in dealing with the word of God. 
If unwarranted liberties can be taken with one passage, the 
same treatment may be accorded to other passages, and in the 
end we shall have nothing but confusion and uncertainty. 

There is a real difference, however, in the two translations, 
the correct one and the liberalistic one. Let us look at them 
closely. We give the correct translation of verse 12: ‘‘And the 
earth brought forth grass, the herb yielding seed after its kind, 
and the tree bearing fruit, wherein is the seed thereof, after its 
kind.” Moffatt’s translation is as follows: ‘“The earth brought 
forth verdure, plants bearing seed of every kind, and trees 
yielding fruit of every kind, fruit with seed in it.” The literal 
rendering of verse 24 is: ‘And God said, Let the earth bring 
forth living creatures after their kind, cattle and creeping things 
and beasts of the earth after their kind: and it was so.” But 
Moffatt’s phrases it in this way: ‘Then God said, ‘Let the 
earth bring forth every kind of living creature, animals, reptiles 
and wild beasts.’ And so it was.” ~ 


66 The Doctrines of Modernism 


Now what is the difference between “of every kind” and 
“after its kind”? The former simply means that in some way 
the earth brought forth all the various kinds of plants and 
animals, and therefore the phrase may readily be interpreted in 
favor of the theory of evolution; whereas the correct translation, 
“after its kind,” refers to the fixity of type in the organic world. 
Mull it over and see whether the two phrases do not convey 
different meanings. If God made each species “after its kind,” 
then he determined the species at the very start—a view that 
does not agree with the evolutionary speculations. In verse 12 
the Bible even says the herb yielded “seed after its kind.” This 
can mean nothing but that each plant was so constituted as to 
reproduce true to its original type. Whatever our preconceived 
notions may be, we should let the Bible speak honestly for itself. 


“Wild Beasts” in Eden 


It is sad, indeed, to be compelled to say that you constantly 
have to watch a liberalist in his treatment of the Bible. Note 
that Dr. Moffatt, in the translation of verse 24 given above, says 
“wild beasts.” In his translation of verse 25 he uses the same 
phrase. But the Hebrew text does not say ‘“‘wild beasts”; it 
says as plainly as words say anything, “beasts of the earth” 
(chy-yoth-aretz; chy-yoth is the plural of chy-ya, which simply 
means a beast). There is not a hint given in the Hebrew at this 
point about “‘wild beasts.”? Neither would such a construction 
agree with the rest of the narrative, which so often tells us that 
God pronounced everything good. Neither does it agree with 
the record in the second chapter of Genesis, which represents 
the animals as very gentle, passing docilely before Adam in order 
that he might give them appropriate names. 

Then why did Dr. Moffatt say “wild beasts’? Was it to 
force the Bible into teaching the theory of evolution? If God in 
the beginning made “wild” beasts, then there is good ground for . 
believing that one of the chief laws of nature, as constituted by 
the Creator, is the “struggle for existence.” Hence the phrase 
“wild beasts” was evidently intended to give the Bible a bent 


Moffatt’s Translation of the Old Testament 67 


toward evolution. But that is not the teaching of the Bible, 
for after finishing the creation, it says (Gen. 1:31): “And God 
saw everything that He had made, and, behold, it was very 
good.” 


A Park or a Garden 


Here is another matter of some significance. In his rendering 
of Genesis 2 Dr. Moffatt constantly substitutes the term “‘park”’ 
for “garden.” Possibly this makes little difference, yet all the 
versions which we have consulted translate the Hebrew words 
(gan, gannah, ginnah) by the word “garden.” Even Kent 
uses this word. Luther gives it “garten,’ which is the same as 
our English “garden.” 

So we can see no good reason for Moffatt’s change. Nor do 
we think that our English idea of a park corresponds with the 
Biblical representation of the original habitat of our first parents 
and their animal companions. A park now-a-days does not 
usually mean a place where edible vegetables and fruit-trees 
grow and abound; it usually means a pleasure resort with walks 
and ponds and trees, and sometimes with wild animals in cages. 
But the “garden eastward in Eden,” described in the Bible, con- 
tained ‘‘every tree that is pleasant to sight and good for food” 
(Gen. 2:9). Afterward (verse 16) God said to Adam, “Of 
every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat’ (the tree of 
forbidden fruit alone excepted). Thus the place must have been 
more like an orchard or a garden than what we ordinarily un- 
derstand by a park. It is better, therefore, to let the meaning of 
the Hebrew text stand without modification. 

Still, even so, our translator is not consistent with himself, for 
a park in the modern sense would hardly be an appropriate place 
for the predacious activities of ‘‘wild beasts.’ Parents would 
hardly permit their children to frolic in such a region. It is high 
time for evangelical believers to become wise to the ways of 
the Modernists, who are ready even to tamper with the text 
of the Sacred Scriptures in the interest of their subjective 
theories. There may be good reason for issuing a translation 


68 The Doctrines of Modernism 


of the Bible in modern language, but it should be a real trans- 
lation, not a biased interpretation. 


A Vault or an Expanse—Which? 


When a chance occurs, the rationalist cannot refrain from 
giving the Bible a “black eye.” In Genesis 1, Dr. Moffatt in- 
variably translates the word rakia by the word “vault.” For 
instance (verse 6): “Then God said, ‘Let there be a Vault 
between the waters to divide them’; so God made the Vault, 
dividing the waters under the Vault from the waters above the 
Vault, and God called the Vault heaven.” 

But many capable Hebraists translate the word rakia by the 
word “expanse.” ‘The American revisers translate it “firma- 
ment,” but place this explanation in the margin, “Heb. 
expanse.” ‘These scholars ought to be fairly good authority. 
Young’s “Analytical Concordance” translates the Hebrew word 
“expanse.” So does Keil. Read his fine explication (pages 52- 
54), in which he shows that the word rafia is the right word for 
designating the atmosphere, separating the waters below from 
the clouds and vapors above. The birds were made to “fly in 
the open expanse of heaven.” Dr. Samuel C. Bartlett (“The 
Veracity of the Hexateuch”’) also translates rakia by ‘‘expanse,” 
and refers it to the atmosphere. See also Walter E. Maunder’s 
illuminating article on ‘Astronomy,’ in ‘The International 
Standard Bible Encyclopedia.” Mr. Maunder bears the titular 
letters, F.R.A.S., and was forty years superintendent of the 
Solar Department of the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, 
London. He ought, therefore, to be able to speak with some 
degree of authority. He refers the Hebrew word rakfia to the 
atmosphere, and proves from a number of related Biblical pas- 
sages that such must have been the understanding of the 
Biblical writers.* 

*It is a pleasure to note that Dr. A. C. Gaebelein, in his magazine, Our 
Hope, has made an independent_study of Dr. Moffatt’s work, especially cover- 
ing the creative narrative of Genesis 1 and 2, and has come to the same 


conclusions as the present writer as to subjective treatment of the Hebrew text 
in this so-called translation. 


Moffatt’s Translation of the Old Testament 69 


Is it too much to ask of the liberalists that they pay some 
attention to the works of conservative scholars? In the face of 
them all, was it right for our author to translate the word 
rakia “vault”? Was it honest to try in this way to fasten upon 
the Biblical writers the old Ptolemaic theory, and thus discredit 
their divine inspiration? 


Did Angels Marry the Daughters of Men? 


Another illustration of the sinister effects of subjectivism is 
seen in Dr. Moffatt’s handling of the marriage of “the sons of 
God and the daughters of men,” recorded in Gen. 6: 1-4. This 
is his translation (so-called) of verses 1 and 2: ‘‘Now when 
men began to multiply over all the earth, and had daughters 
born to them, the angels noticed that the daughters of men 
were beautiful, and they married any of them that they 
chose.” 

Why this mishandling of the Word of God? Answer: In 
order to carry out the conception of the radical critics that the 
early chapters of the Bible are mythical! If they can fasten on 
the Bible the absurd doctrine that angels intermarried with 
human beings, they think they have proved their contention. It 
is a case of “the wish being father to the thought.” But we 
would remind the critics (and with them all other folk) that 
the Hebrew text does not say ‘“‘angels”’; it says, “the sons of 
God.” Consult the Hebrew itself and see. Therefore Moffatt’s 
version is not a translation. On the contrary, it is a case of 
eisegesis—a manipulation in the interest of a human theory! 
Does the author not know what evangelical scholars have said 
again and again on this point? So long ago as 1897, Dr. Samuel 
C. Bartlett showed clearly, in his work, ‘“The Veracity of the 
Hexateuch,” that the phrase, “sons of God” in this context, 
could not mean angels, but the descendants of Seth. Read his 
convincing arguments on page 186-189 of the above-named 
work. In concluding his disquisition, Dr. Bartlett adds: ‘When 
so understood, the narrative presents no monstrous myth, but a 
series of events as credible and seemingly historical in their 


70 The Doctrines of Modernism 


character and consequences as the invasion of England by 
the Danes.” ‘To these one-sided critics is also recommended 
the careful perusal of Dr. C. F. Keil’s elaborate presenta- 
tion of this subject in his commentary on Genesis (pages 
127-137, including the lengthy footnote). Do the radical 
critics never read a book on the conservative side of these 
questions ? 

It may be said that Bartlett and Keil are too old to be cited 
as authorities. We reply, they are not older than Graf, Well- 
hausen and Kuenen, who are followed by the twisting critics. 
However, “The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia’ is 
not ancient or archaic. In this work, Dr. George Frederick 
Wright upholds the evangelical view and gives sound reasons 
therefor (see his article on “Antediluvians”’). Neither can a 
more recent work be called “out-worn’—namely, A. H. Finn’s 
“The Creation, Fall and Deluge,” in which the author upholds 
the evangelical view with much cogent reasoning. He con- 
vincingly refutes Dr. Driver’s contention for the radical view. 
Mr. Finn’s arguments are found on pages 101-106 of his book. 
On page 101, he quotes Driver as saying of this narrative, “We 
must see in it an ancient Hebrew legend, . . . the intention of 
which was to account for the origin of a supposed race of pre- 
historic giants.” Just so! ‘The radical critics want to make out 
that the early Bible narratives are myths and legends; hence 
they insist on an interpretation of this narrative that supports 
their views. We hold that this procedure is wrong in a pro- 
fessed translation of the Bible. ‘The only honest method would 
have been to translate the Hebrew text just as it reads—‘“the 
sons of God” and “‘the daughters of men’”—and then let readers 
draw their own conclusions. 


Jehovah as the Eternal 


Perhaps it will do no harm to translate “Jehovah” (Jah- 
weh) as “the Eternal,’ as Dr. Moffatt does throughout his so- 
called translation. Still, it is another instance of subjectivism. Is 
he sure that the Hebrew word “Jahweh” means the Eternal? 


Moffatts Translation of the Old Testament 71 


No; he cannot be sure. Many exegetes think the word may be 
translated, “I am that I am.” But who can tell for a certainty 
what that phrase means? It might mean, “I am the Stead- 
fast One.” For this reason some scholars think it means “the 
covenant-keeping God,” the One who walks and talks with 
men and cares for them. Here are honest differences of opinion 
among Biblical scholars of all schools. Why, then, should a 
“translator” put his own individual interpretation on the divine 
name? Why not simply translate the Hebrew literally Jahweh 
(or even Jehovah, since most English readers are accustomed to 
that form) ? Then each reader can choose for himself what he 
thinks the name means. 

Not to be hypercritical, it does not seem to us to be good 
literary form to use an adjective continuously as a substantive. 
Note how crude it sounds: ‘“Then God the Eternal moulded 
man from the dust of the ground” (Gen. 2:7) ; ““Then said God 
the Eternal, ‘It is not good for man to be alone’ ” (Gen. 2:18) ; 
“In the cool of the day, when they heard the sound of God the 
Eternal walking in the park” (Gen. 3:8); “Said the Eternal 
to Abram” (Gen. 12:1); “Then the Eternal let him alone, 
when Zipporah cried” (Ex. 1:26) ; “Moses was told to go up 
to the Eternal” (Ex. 25:1). Is it good usage to turn an ad- 
jective into a noun in that free way, and do it over and over 
again? Would it not have been better simply to have translated 
Jahweh Elohim, by ‘“‘the Lord God,” with a marginal explana- 
tion that the Hebrew for ‘‘Lord” is Jahweh, and that for “God” 
is Elohim? If Jahweh had to be interpreted as meaning “the 
Eternal,’ why was not Elohim treated in the same way? A 
translator ought to follow some consistent rule. 


Elders or Sheikhs—Which? 


It is pathetic to have to follow the arbitrary procedure of the 
dismantling Biblical critics in their treatment of the Word of 
God. Whenever they can find a parallelism between the chil- 
dren of Israel and the pagan tribes around them, they take 
apparent delight in doing so. The idea seems to be to reduce the 


72 The Doctrines of Modernism 


Bible to the level of heathen literature. Here is a case with Dr. 
Moffatt. 

In almost every instance the term, “elders of Israel,” is 
translated the ‘“‘sheikhs of Israel.” Take Ex. 3:16: “Go and 
gather the sheikhs of Israel, and tell them,” etc. Also Ex. 4:29; 
12:21; 17:5; 18:12; Deut. 5:30; 31:28, and so on. 

Now, why was the word “elders” translated “sheikhs” ? 
Because that is the name of the leaders or chiefs of pagan, 
nomadic clans and tribes. To use the term in connection with 
Israel reduces God’s people to the level of wild, roving tribes, 
like those of the Bedouin. Thus the general conception of 
Christian people that Israel was God’s “peculiar people’ is 
destroyed, and confidence is sapped in the doctrine that God had 
special oversight over them, and endued their prophets with 
special inspiration. It is all a leveling process. 

Was it, however, exegetically correct for, Dr. Moffatt to 
translate the word “elders” by the word “‘sheikhs”? It was not. 
Look up the word for “elders” in your Hebrew Bible. It is the 
word zaken, which means “old, aged, bearded” (see Young’s 
‘Analytical Concordance”), derived from zakan, “a beard, 
which is a mark of old age or manhood” (see Roy’s Hebrew and 
English Dictionary). By this we see that the accurate 
translation of the word zaken is “elder.” The people of 
God had their elders, who were leading men among them, 
because of their wisdom, age, and experience, but they were 
not “sheikhs.” 

Another surprise meets us at this point. In the American 
revision we read (Gen. 50:7): “And Joseph went up to bury 
his father; and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, 
the elders of his house, and all the elders of the land of Egypt.” 
In this place, which deals with heathen people, the Egyptians, 
our critic places them on quite a high standard: ‘“‘the servants 
of Pharaoh” are called his “courtiers”; the “elders” (plural of 
zaken), are called “the chief men” and “the heads of Egypt.” 
Yes, when this “translator” deals with the “elders” of Egypt, 
they are given very dignified and civilized titles; but when he 


Moffatt’s Translation of the Old Testament 73 


describes the “elders” of God’s people, they are just “‘sheikhs’’ ! 
This is subjectivism run to seed. 

But observe that our author gives another translation of 
“elders” elsewhere, inconsistent as his method is. In Deuteron- 
omy (32:7), which is a stanza of Moses’ swan song, we have 
the following quatrain, which we translate literally: 


“Remember the days of old, 

Consider the years of many generations; 
Ask thy father, and he will show thee; 
Thine elders, and they will tell thee.” 


Note Moffatt’s rendering: 


“Remember the days of old, 
Review the years, age after age, 
Ask your sires to tell you, 

Ask your seniors to repeat.” 


The italics are ours. Here he translated the word zaken 
“seniors.” Why did he not translate it “‘sheikhs’? Oh, that 
would not have looked well: “Ask your sheikhs to repeat!” 
Does Dr. Moffatt know for sure that Moses meant “seniors” 
in this context? Does he know he did not mean the J/eaders 
of the people? In the previous line he had said, “Ask your 
sires to tell you”; then why did he use tautology by adding, 
‘““Ask your seniors to repeat”? . If, however, we translate the 
Hebrew word by ‘elders,’ meaning the people’s leaders, there 
is no repetition, but progress of thought. 


Spoiling the Shepherd Psalm 


At this writing Volume II of Dr. Moffatt’s translation has 
just reached us, and we cannot take time to examine many sec- 
tions of it. Instinctively we turn to the twenty-third Psalm. 
We fear he has not improved it, not even from the viewpoint 
of literary finish, rhythm and felicity of expression. The 
English of the King James version is more acceptable than that 
of the Modernistic reviser. Let us compare the two recensions 
by placing them in parallel columns: 


74 


THE Kinc JAMES VERSION 


The Lord is my shepherd; I 
shall not want. 

He maketh me to lie down in 
green pastures: he leadeth me 
beside the still waters. 

He restoreth my soul: he lead- 
eth me in the paths of righteous- 
ness for His name’s sake. 

Yea, though I walk through the 
valley of the shadow of death, I 
will fear no evil: for thou art 
with me; thy rod and thy staff 
they comfort me. 

Thou preparest a table before 
me in the presence of mine 
enemies: thou anointest my head 
with oil; my cup runneth over. 

Surely goodness and mercy shall 
follow me all the days of my life: 
and I will dwell in the house of 
the Lord for ever. 


The Doctrines of Modernism 


Tue MoFFATT VERSION 


The Eternal shepherds me, I lack 
for nothing; 
he makes me lie in meadows green, 
he leads me to refreshing streams, 
and revives life in me. 
He guides me by true paths, as he 
himself is true. 
My road may run through a glen 
of gloom, 

but I fear no harm, for thou art 
beside me; 

thy club, thy staff—they give me 
courage. 

Thou art my host, spreading a 
feast for me, 

while my foes have to look on! 

Thou hast poured oil upon my 
head, 

my cup is brimming over; 

yes, all through my life 

Goodness and Kindness wait on 
me, 

the Eternal’s guest, 

within his household evermore. 


We leave it to the reader’s intuition to judge whether, if such 
tame, awkward English and such a cluttered form had been 
used in translating this peerless Psalm, it ever would have 
spoken peace and comfort to sorrowing souls. Think of this, 
“My road may run through a glen of gloom,” as a substitute 
for, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of 
death.” Note the banality of the sentence, ‘“Thy club, thy 
stafi—they give me courage.” ‘The form in which the trans- 
lation is put is bunglesome. The first word of each line of 
poetry should begin with a capital letter. Why should the pro- 
nouns of the Deity begin with lower-case letters, while “Kind- 
ness” in the third line from the last begins with a capital? 

In leafing through Dr. Moffatt’s translation of Isaiah, you 
will note the frequent use of the double square brackets. Ac- 
cording to the preface, “this denotes, throughout the entire Old 


Moffatt’s Translation of the Old Testament 75 


Testament, passages which are either editorial additions or 
later interpolations.”’ We must confess that these signs seem to 
us to be used in an arbitrary way, are the result of subjective 
views illy founded, and are designed to nullify the predictive 
element in many contexts. Wherever the text as it stands in the 
Hebrew would indicate a clear case of foretelling, the brackets 
are used to convey the impression that those statements were 
added after the events took place, the editor or interpolator 
desiring to make it appear that the prophet was divinely inspired 
with the gift of prediction. Again we are led reluctantly to say 
that this method seems to us to be taking an unwarranted liberty 
with the sacred text. Such treatment of the Bible cannot do 
otherwise than destroy confidence in its inspiration and 
authority. 

Our criticisms of this work may seem to be somewhat rigor- 
ous, but that cannot be helped. We are not blind to the fact, 
however, that Dr. Moffatt’s work has many merits, and clears 
up a good many points which were otherwise obscure. For this 
we are thankful. But we are filled with all the greater sorrow 
that so competent a Biblical scholar did not lay aside his ex parte 
views and predilections, and give the world, in the fluent 
English he is able to command, a clear, straightforward and 
accurate translation of the text of the Bible. Had he made such 
a recension, he might have done untold service to the cause of 
evangelical Christianity. As it is, however, he has greatly 
marred his work, largely curtailed its influence, and added 
another contribution to the many divisive factors now disrupt- 
ing our unhappy Christendom. 

If the world to-day must have a translation of the Bible in 
limpid modern English, made so simple that people do not need 
to think at all in order to understand it, then it should be done 
by some one who will and can, as nearly as possible, reproduce 
the true meaning of the Biblical text without prejudice and 
without partisanship. 


CHAPTER III 


THE FAITH OF MODERNISM 


Impressionistic and Assertive 


extended analysis of Dr. Shailer Mathews’ recent book, 

“The Faith of Modernism”; but we have had to decide 
that time and space are too valuable. All in all, the book seems 
to us to be an impossible one. It is such a sad mixture of truth 
and error that it would require another book of equal size to 
separate the two and make good the distinction by a rational 
process. For this reason we shall do nothing more than call 
attention to a number of one-sided statements to indicate the 
general character of the work. 

The first thing to be said is that it is thoroughly impression- 
istic, not scientific and accurate. There is scarcely a reference 
in it to an authoritative scientific or historical work; not a foot- 
note; no authors cited, with the titles and pages of their books. 
Dr. Mathews has simply read books, gotten his individual im- 
pressions from them, and then has drawn on his memory and 
imagination to formulate those impressions. 

Moreover, the book is thoroughly assertive in tone. There is 
no close reasoning to show why the author holds his views, but 
asseveration upon asseveration. Dr. Mathews would simply 
substitute his own dogmatism for the old “dogmatism” which he 
so scornfully rejects. Instead of the Bible as the authority in 
religion, he would substitute the theory of evolution as the 
norm in deciding all points in dispute among Christian peo- 
ple. But there is no argument presented in favor of the evolu- 

76 


A" FIRST it was our intention to give a somewhat 


The Faith of Modernism 77 


tion hypothesis; it is simply taken for granted, in spite of the 
fact that many acute thinkers today declare that it is far from 
having been demonstrated. 


One-Sided Views 


You might go through the book sentence by sentence and 
show how frequently inadequate statements occur. Take such a 
statement as this (p. 64): ‘Heresy is the belief of a defeated 
party.’ What a superficial view of the experience and travail 
of the Christian Church’s heroic and sincere attempts to express 
what it believed to be the true Biblical doctrine! Surely a 
Modernist who professes to be so far advanced beyond his 
fellows ought to plow deeper than that. 

Think of the Arian heresy—was it merely “the belief of a 
defeated party”? Had Arianism prevailed, what would it have 
done for Christianity? It would have made of Christ a Greek 
demigod—the first and greatest creature God made. What 
would have been the result? A destructive and superstitious 
element of paganism would have been grafted into the Chris- 
tian system, so that ever afterward all Christians who wor- 
shipped Christ would have been idolaters, giving homage to a 
creature instead of to the Creator. It is doubtful whether 
Christianity would have survived more than a century with such 
a barnacle of heresy hanging upon it and sucking at its life. 
Was Arianism nothing but “the belief of a defeated party”? 

Or suppose Marcionism and other forms of Gnosticism had 
gained the ascendency during the early centuries of Christian 
history, then Christianity, instead of remaining pure and in- 
tegral, would have been a pot pourri of Christian truth and 
pagan philosophy. Think of Docetism, too, which denied the 
real humanity of our Lord, declaring that his body was only 
phantasmal body. What a welter that would have made of 
Christianity had it become the dominant power! The same 
may be said of the heresies of Apollinaris, Nestorius, Cerinthus, 
Pelagius, Socinus and Abelard. No, no; the Modernists must 
think more clearly; they must study Christian history to better 


78 The Doctrines of Modernism 


effect. Heresy is a disease and error that is much more funda- 
mental and pernicious than merely “the belief of a defeated 
party.” 

Says Dr. Mathews again (p. 2): ‘Religion springs from 
human needs.” ‘To our mind, this statement tallies with the 
superficial mode of thinking that so largely characterizes the 
purveyors of Modernism. It may be that in a secondary sense 
religions do come from human need. But whence comes the 
human need? What is its source? Why does man need 
religion? The animals seem to enjoy life without religion. Why 
do they not need religion or a knowledge of God? The answer 
is plain: they were not created with such a need or proclivity. / 
But man was. God made man for Himself. Therefore He 
placed in man’s soul the longing for God, an unrest until it finds 
God. Why not be thorough-going, therefore, and say that ulti- 
mately religion springs from God, who created man to be a 
religious being? 

Again, even if it were true, as Dr. Mathews holds, that the 
Bible springs from our religion, the question would arise, “Is 
our religion the true religion, the religion God gave to the 
world?” If it is the true religion, then the Bible which sprang 
from it must also be true. On the other hand, if the Bible is 
full of error, then our religion must also be full of error, and 
so what have we upon which to fix our faith and hope? What 
a pale and unsatisfying type of religion the Modernists want to 
substitute for true Biblical religion! Their substitute gives no 
real resting place for the intellect and reason and no solid com- 
fort to the heart. 

Our author makes another mistake. In drawing a contrast 
between the Modernist and the person whom he is pleased to 
call the Dogmatist, by which he means the conservative believer, 
he says (p. 18): “Both are professedly loyal to Christ, but the 
Dogmatist makes the Bible rather than Christ basal.” 

We do not know anyone, whether a dogmatist or anything 
else, who commits so egregious a blunder. If by dogmatists this 
writer means the people who hold firmly to the Bible, he has 


The Faith of Modernism 79 


mistaken their views in a way that is most inexcusable. We 
challenge him to cite a single statement from an evangelical 
writer or speaker who places the Bible above Christ. Nobody 
takes so ridiculous a position. It is Christ who gives authority 
to the Bible, because He promised to His apostles the Holy 
Spirit to guide them into all truth; and He again and again 
endorsed the Old Testament and referred to it as of divine 
authority. But where do we get our knowledge of Christ? 
Only from the Bible. The Modernists themselves must go to 
the Bible for their knowledge of Christ. They cannot call 
down that knowledge out of the blue. But if our only source- 
book is unreliable, how do we know that the Christ in whom 
we trust is the real Saviour of the world? To put it as truly 
as we know how: Christ is basal because He is the Redeemer 
of the world and gave us the Bible; the Bible is basal as our 
source-book because it tells us who Christ is, that we may 
trust and worship Him. Nobody who truly believes the Bible: 
worships the Bible, because the Bible itself admonishes men to 
worship God only. True Christians worship the Christ whom 
the Bible reveals. 


Examples of Half-Truths 


It is a pity to have to say that Dr. Mathews’ book teems with 
half-truths and erratic statements. We say half-truths, because 
he often makes a statement rejecting one truth and accepting 
another, when he ought to accept both; he should be all-sided 
instead of one-sided. For example (p. 22), in giving some of the 
outstanding principles of Modernism, he says: “It is not aiming 
at a system of theology but at organizing life on a Christian 
basis.” But why not aim at both? Is not this a scientific 
age? Dr. Mathews himself has much to say in praise of 
science. Whenever a scholarly attempt is made to investigate 
a subject, the material is assembled and classified into a system. 
Well, if that is done everywhere else, why should it not be done 
in religion? What is theology? It is simply the science of 
religion. Why should we not have theology as well as simple 


80 The Doctrines of Modernism 


religion, just as we have botany and the simple love of flowers 
and plants, and astronomy and the layman’s love of the stars? 
Does our Modernist want definiteness and system in every 
branch of knowledge except religion? Is he satisfied with the 
inchoate, misty, indeterminate kind of religion? Do we want 
religious fog today, or the clear sunshine of definiteness ? 

Our friends, the Modernists, refuse to accept the Bible as the 
final authority in matters of religion. ‘Then what do they intend 
to put in its stead? ‘They must either find a substitute or admit 
that there is no final authority. Which will they choose? If 
the latter, as is likely to be the case, the greatest thing in the 
world, religion, is based upon the sand, and will not be able to 
endure the storms of life. A religion without some authorita- 
tive standard is like a wisp of the wind; it has no stability. 
However, the Modernists—at least, some of them—regard each 
man’s individual experience as the final authority. Well, that 
sets up as many different sources of authority as there are indi- 
viduals, which is about as poor a shift as no authority at all. 
Even the infidel may hold that his experience is totally different 
from that of the regenerated believer. With the Modernist, if 
he is at all consistent and logical, religion is pale, shifting, 
evanescent. 

“The dogmatic mind has never been as severe with sinners as 
it has been with heretics.” So says Mathews in his book. Of 
course, as the context shows, he means by “the dogmatic mind” 
conservative thinkers, whether they be Protestant or Catholic. 
No doubt there is some truth in what he says in this connection. 
The people he calls “sinners” were always outside of the church 
and the pales of Christianity, while the “heretics”? were enemies 
within the church. Is not a traitor within a country more 
dangerous than an open enemy outside? Would not a betrayer 
inside a family be worse than an outspoken foe outside? Is not 
Judas more culpable than even the avowed enemies of Christ? 
‘How do most Americans look upon Benedict Arnold? Thus 
there is reason for the church’s severe attitude toward false 
teachers who operate within the folds of the church. 


The Faith of Modernism 81 


Who are Evangelical? 


“Modernists as a class are evangelical Christians. That is, 
they accept Jesus Christ as the Revelation of a Saviour-God.” 

This affirmation must be put into the crucible. Observe that 
Dr. Mathews seems to be anxious to be regarded as “evan- 
gelical.’’ Although he declares heresy to be so slight a departure 
as to be only “‘the belief of a defeated party,” yet he does not 
like to bear the onus of that name, but prefers the name 
evangelical. This is another instance of confusion of thought, 
leading to confusion in the use of terms. It would be tanta- 
mount to saying that evangelicals and heretics are one and the 
same type of persons. Mull it over in your mind for a minute— 
the spectacle of an apologist for heresy wanting to be known 
as an evangelical believer! 

But going back to the last quotation from Dr. Mathews, 
observe how adroitly he uses his terms. He says that Jesus 
Christ is “the Revelation of a Saviour-God.” But an ideal 
man might be that; he might by his teaching reveal God as a 
Saviour. Why, even Paul made God known in that way. But 
the question is, was Christ Himself the Saviour-God? The 
affirmative or negative answer to that question will determine 
whether the respondent is evangelical or heretical. Once for 
all, we wish to say that it is not enough for Modernists to 
assert that Christ was “the revelation of God.” The evangelical 
view is this: Christ was the God-Man, and for that reason, and 
that alone, He was able to give a true and full revelation of 
the Godhead. He was “God manifest in the flesh.” “In the 
beginning was the Logos; and the Logos was with God, and 
the Logos was God. ... And the Logos became (egeneto) 
flesh, and tabernacled among us, and we beheld His glory.” 

Another inconsistency occurs in Dr. Mathews’ reasoning. 
He is much opposed to creeds, to the “formulation” of doctrine. 
He does not even want the Modernists to compose formulas of 
their views. And yet near the end of his book he himself actual- 
ly proposes a creed for them. He says that “a Modernist, in 


82 The Doctrines of Modernism 


his own words and with his own patterns, can make affirma- 
tions not unlike the following.” ‘Then he sets forth a creed 
of thirteen articles, each of them beginning with the formal 
statement, ‘‘I believe.” 


The Real Dogmatists 


Our caveat must be entered against the name by which our 
author tried to discredit evangelical believers: he calls them 
“Dogmatists.” He wants to divide the church into two classes, 
the Dogmatists and the Modernists. ‘This book itself being wit- 
ness, we hold that our Modernist is himself an out-and-out 
dogmatist (which we will not dignify with a capital D). As 
has previously been said, the book is not a well-reasoned thesis, 
proving proposition by proposition in logical sequence, but a 
series of categorical asseverations. The tone and manner of it is 
purely dogmatic, in the popular sense of that term. 

Let it be understood too, that those who accept the evangel in 
its full tonality are the evangelical party of the Christian 
church. That name has come down to them to this day by his- 
torical continuity and succession from the era of the Reforma- 
tion; and they do not propose to surrender this good name, 
which describes their true doctrinal and experiential position; 
whereas it is not an appropriate term for those who mutilate 
the Bible by rejecting whatever does not agree with their 
humanly devised philosophies. For the latter party to claim the 
name “evangelical” is theological larceny. 

As for the word “dogmatist,” let it be applied to every man 
who makes mere assertions as if they were true because he makes 
them, without furnishing good reasons for their acceptance by 
other people. 

The “inerrancy” of the Bible and the “formulation” of doc- 
trine (what he calls “theology”) seem to be the special objects 
of Dr. Mathews’ dislike. Again and again he returns to the 
assault. Just as if it were possible for any organization to be 
formed or any country to be established and unified without a 
formulated body of principles! If the Modernists are not satis- 


The Faith of Modernism 83 


fied with the churches and their confessional statements, why 
do they not form an organization of their own, without requir- 
ing any statement of beliefs, but simply on the principle, “Let 
every one believe just what he pleases”? We regret to have 
to say that the author’s view of ‘“‘Jesus Christ as the Revealer 
of the Saving God” (the title of one of his chapters) is not 
an adequate statement of the person and work of our Lord and 
is far from the Biblical and evangelical doctrine. The chapter 
on “Jesus and Human Need” is better, but fails to show how 
Jesus satisfies the very deepest need of the human soul for a 
Redeemer from sin by becoming man’s Substitute before the 
holy law of God. 

We regret the necessity of being so critical of a book that 
contains many excellent passages. We have tried not to be 
hypercritical. Necessity has been laid upon us by the conviction 
that Dr. Mathews’ book is one of the most dangerous recent 
books, and its perilous character is due largely to the very fact 
that it is so adroit an admixture of truth and error. May the 
Christian Church be led by the Bible, the Holy Spirit, and right 
and clear reasoning to discriminate between error and truth 
in the present Babel of voices, to hear and recognize the voice 
of the true Shepherd, and to follow Him! 


CHAPTER IV 


MODERNISM AND EVANGELICAL 
CHRISTIANITY 


SoME OF THEIR VITAL DISAGREEMENTS 


like The Christian Century. It is a real study in psy- 

chology. This editor has been pointing out the funda- 
mental differences between the conceptions of Fundamentalism 
and Modernism, and has been showing very acutely that they 
are irreconcilable. There can be no truce between them; no 
armistice can be agreed upon and signed by the opposing parties. 
In this respect the editor has been proving himself far more 
acute and logical than the would-be pacifists, who can see no 
good reason for the present controversy. 

However, our editor commits some mistakes that are hardly 
excusable in one who has such keen insight in other ways. In 
an editorial he essays to point out the essential difference between 
the fundamentalist and modernist views of Jesus. “Funda- 
mentalism comes to the figure of Jesus by the dogmatic route,” 
he avers... . ‘To the Fundamentalist the significance of 
Jesus’ personality is interpreted by a certain doctrinal frame- 
work into which the historical figure is made to fit.” 


[: IS instructive to read the editorials of a liberalistic journal 


How Men Come to Jesus 


That may sound deep, but it is a mistake. We doubt whether 
there is a single true Fundamentalist of whom it can justly 
be said that he came “to the figure of Jesus by the dogmatic 
route.” No, he did not get his view of Jesus Christ by mere 

a4 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 85 


intellectual processes. On the contrary, he came to Jesus by 
the experiential route. No big words and no abstruse state- 
ments need be made to describe the process. The Funda- 
mentalist read his Bible. He found there a certain description 
of Jesus Christ, which told him that Christ came to save men 
from their sins, to regenerate their hearts, and to enlighten 
their minds by the Holy Spirit, so that they would receive the 
experience of truth, pardon and salvation. He also found that 
many persons of his acquaintance, whose testimony could not 
be impeached, bore witness that by coming to Christ in humble 
faith and repentance, they had found Him always making good 
in their experience. He also read in history about “the great 
cloud of witnesses’ who gave the same positive testimony. 
Then he went to Christ in the way the New Testament 
directed, and received the divine assurance for himself, and 
not another. 

Yes, that is the simple fact, divested of all attempts at 
profundity and hair-splitting distinctions. If the Fundamentalist 
interprets Christ by “‘a certain doctrinal framework,” it is the 
framework set forth in the New Testament, proven by expe- 
rience to be the true framework. We challenge the editor of 
the said journal to produce a single Fundamentalist who will 
confess that he found Christ to be his Lord and Saviour by 
first mastering and accepting a profound work on Christian 
dogmatics. On the contrary, we venture the assertion that in 
every case the Fundamentalist found Christ in the New Testa- 
ment, accepted him by faith, and thus verified in the 
resultant experience that the New ‘Testament Christ is the 
historic Christ, the present Christ, the true Christ, the saving 
Christ. 

Our tripod man of The Christian Century goes on to define 
the “framework” in which the Fundamentalist finds or places 
Christ. His description closely follows the New Testament 
characterization of Christ. In this respect the editor is correct; 
the Fundamentalist does believe in the Christ of the Bible; 
it was only through accepting Him that peace and assurance 


86 The Doctrines of Modernism 


came to his heart and mind. Seeing how well the Bible is 
authenticated by “many infallible proofs” (Acts 1:3), he is sure 
that the Christ of the Bible is the real historical Christ. If that 
is so, he knows that his faith is based on a solid body oY facts. 
He is no pragmatist, holding truth in dubio. 


The Modernist’s Mistake 


But what about the Modernist’s conception of Christ? 
According to our deponent, ‘“Modernism approaches Him as a 
fact of history.” 

Not so! Modernism does not study history as it really is, 
but warps and twists it to fit it into the theory of evolution. 
In witness whereof we cite its treatment of the Old Testa- 
ment history, by which whole sections of the narrative are 
transposed from their historical position to another place of 
much later date, and that solely because in that way it is sup- 
posed to agree better with the aforesaid theory. “That is not 
historical treatment; it is subjective manipulation. Just so Mod- 
ernism construes Christ; in some way it must compress Him 
into the ironclad mould of evolution. ‘Thus, in interpreting 
Modernism itself, our editor loses his sagacity. 

It is Fundamentalism—or, if you like the term better, Con- 
servatism—which approaches Christ as ‘‘a fact of history.” It 
finds by scientific and historical investigation that the New 
Testament is a historical record; therefore Christ must be a 
real historical personage; and if He is that, He is worthy of 
all acceptation, for He claims to be the Son of God in a unique 
sense, and the Saviour of the world, and men find that, when 
they come to Him as a historical reality, He makes good; He 
gives assurance of pardon, truth and salvation. And that con- 
notes the historical approach, and spells investigation and experi- 
ence according to the historical method. No! it is not the sub- 
jective method, because many, many persons, who once were 
arch doubters and unbelievers, have come to Christ in the man- 
ner above indicated, and have found Him to be the way, the 
truth, and the life. 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 87 


A Double-Headed Subjectivism 


To prove beyond a question that Modernism is a subjective 
method of approaching Christ, we need only to quote further 
from our editor. He says: “Modernism from its side, ap- 
proaching Jesus with utter reverence for His personality, looks 
with skepticism upon the finality of the system of concepts with 
which His first interpreters sought to understand Him.” 

What follows is of the same cloth, however much elaborated. 
If that is not subjectivism, we do not understand the meaning 
of the term. It is a kind of double-headed subjectivism. First, 
it approaches “Jesus with utter reverence for His personality.” 
That is subjectivism. Of course, we are glad that the Modern- 
ists do approach Jesus with reverence, illogical as their method 
is. But why do they approach Him thus? They are skeptical of 
the correctness of the interpretation put upon Him by His 
earliest and direct followers. ‘Then what is their historical 
basis? And why should they approach Him with reverence? 
They must either force themselves into their mental state of 
reverence, or else accept a good deal of the testimony of His 
earliest interpreters. In the second case—which is perhaps the 
true one—they accept as much of the New Testament record 
as fits into their scheme, and reject the rest. Subjectivism pure 
and simple! The very opposite of the historical method! 


Method of the True Believer 


In contrast with the method of approach through precon- 
ceived notions, let us place the method of the evangelical be- 
liever, who once was filled with skepticism and prejudice, but 
who was afterward truly converted. His own efforts at finding 
truth and peace having failed, he was induced to try Christ just 
as He is pictured in the New Testament. He came with much 
doubt and prejudice, and even with rebellion in his heart. But 
his soul craved the truth. So he continued his seeking in the 
Biblical way—through contrition, humility, open-mindedness 
and prayer. What was the result? A true conversion; a 


88 The Doctrines of Modernism 


positive assurance of truth and pardon; a peace that passed all 
understanding; and all of it attributed directly and only to the 
Christ of the New ‘Testament. 

Yes, that is the way the real Christian believer arrived at his 
conclusions; through regeneration, begetting experience; never 
once “by the dogmatic route”; never once through “a certain 
doctrinal framework’; never once through the swallowing ofa 
whole body of dogmatic theology, however orthodox and con- 
servative. These doctrinal systems of the evangelical church 
have their place and their use, and are necessary for the con- 
servation of the plenary truth of Christianity; but they come 
after the experience that the Bible is God’s direct and special 
revelation of His beneficent plan of creation, preservation and 
redemption. 

On the other hand, the way of Modernism, which “looks 
with skepticism on the finality of the system” set forth by the 
inspired apostles, leads its votaries, if continued in, into all sorts 
of doubts, uncertainties and vagaries; in proof of which assertion 
we simply point to the ambiguity and indeterminateness of the 
doctrines of Modernism itself. It is a welter of human beliefs in 
suspense. 


How a Modernist Would Keep the Faith 


In some of his books and. other writings Dr. Charles R. 
Brown, Dean of the Yale Divinity School, says many good and 
wholesome things. He has an epigrammatic way that is arrest- 
ing. In some discourses he makes declarations that sound as 
if he belonged to the veriest orthodox school. 

But, alas! the next time he opens his mouth or hammers his 
typewriter, he puts himself definitely on the side of the Modern- 
ists, making many gratuitous flings at the old-time Biblical faith. 

In a recent book, “Christianity and Modern Thought,” Dean 
Brown furnishes the initial chapter, and seems to sound the 
keynote of the whole book. Yet it must be said, in fairness to 
all parties, that the chapters furnished by Charles A. Dinsmore 
and Robert E. Speer are gems, and contain no jibes at evan- 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 89 


gelical doctrine and faith. They ought not to be in such com- 
pany; there is danger that their good name as evangelical 
believers will be tarnished by such association. 

In this section we shall deal only with Dean Brown’s con- 
tribution to the book, although there are other chapters, espe- 
cially those by Richard §. Lull, Albert P. Fitch and Benjamin 
W. Bacon, that are open to serious criticism. Our purpose in 
analyzing Dr. Brown’s essay is to show forth once more the 
wayward thinking of modernistic theologians. 

In the first place, Dean Brown confuses the two uses of the 
word faith, the objective and the subjective. The title of his 
essay is, ‘“Keeping the Faith.” Evidently this title was suggested 
to him by Paul’s expression, “I have kept the faith” (2 Tim. 
4:7). Here the word ‘faith’ is used in the objective sense, 
meaning the Christian system of truth, or, as we might put it, 
what Paul believed to be true. But Dr. Brown uses the word 
for the most part in the subjective sense, as if his subject were 
“Keeping Faith,” instead of “Keeping the Faith.” Hence he 
introduces confusion of thought by amplifying on the need of 
faith in general in order to maintain life. Nowhere does he 
make a real and thorough-going effort to discover what was that 
body of truth to which Paul declared, at the close of his life, 
that he had been loyal. Yet he could very easily have found out 
what Paul meant had he gone to Paul’s numerous writings in 
the New Testament. He would especially have seen by that 
exegetical process, which is the only proper one, that Paul held 
to the deity of Christ, His atoning power and merit, His bodily 
resurrection, His visible return to the world in judgment, justi- 
fication by faith, and salvation by grace. But none of these 
definite doctrines of Paul’s theology are named in the dean’s 
article. Invariably, when a Modernist sets forth what he calls 
“the faith,” he does not go to the Bible as his source-book, but to 
his own subjective theological notions. We maintain that Paul 
meant by “keeping the faith” holding fast the whole body of 
truth which he had taught. If he did not mean that, his expres- 
sion was as vague as are the lucubrations of the Modernists of 


90 The Doctrines of Modernism 


our day. Thus Dr. Brown made a wrong use of his text. That 
was neither good homiletics nor correct hermeneutics. 

Our author first deals with his subject negatively. Here is 
the well-known lingo of the Modernist: “First, keeping the 
faith does not mean thinking about things in general exactly 
as men thought about them in the fifteenth century or in 
the first.” : 

Now what is the use for a learned dean to thrash over such 
beaten straw? Who holds that men must think about every- 
thing ‘‘exactly” as they once did? Nobody. Therefore it is a 
waste of precious time and effort to set up men of straw and 
then tear them down. Moreover, in Paul’s mind, “keeping the 
faith’ was not a matter of men’s “thinking,” but of what God 
had revealed to him as the gospel of salvation. —The Modernists 
bank too much on their own “thinking,” and too little on 
the illumination of the Holy Scriptures and the Holy Spirit, 
and for that reason their logic on spiritual matters goes limping 
so often. Listen to this: “Keeping the faith, then, does not 
mean thinking about things in general exactly as Methuselah 
did.”’ Such a statement is not worth refuting, for no one holds 
so childish a view. 

Dean Brown says that a full description of all the outgrown 
religious beliefs would fill the Encyclopedia Britannica. That 
is an exaggeration. But volumes might be truthfully written 
about outgrown scientific theories and heretical departures from 
the Word of God. Go back and read about all the Trinitarian 
and Christological heresies and see. In science the explanation 
of evolution by Charles Darwin has scarcely an advocate 
today, and yet his views were pretty much the vogue only 
twenty-five years ago. No; science is far from semper idem. A 
relevant quotation from that capable scientist, Professor Louis 
Trenchard More, is here inserted from his notable recent book 
(1925), “The Dogma of Evolution” (pp. 352-353) : 

“Or do men of science recognize that they are living in glass 
houses and that it is dangerous to throw stones? When they 
scoff at philosophy and religion because of seventy-odd jarring 


Modernism and Evangelical Christiamty 91 


sects which cannot agree, they forget their own inability to 
solve the nature of matter and energy, and that the pathway 
of science is strewn with the wrecks of cherished hypotheses.” 

Much is said by Dean Brown about what he used to believe 
when he was a child, and how his views have changed since 
he “became a man.” He classes himself with Paul in this respect 
(but misuses Paul’s illustration). He says “I thought of God 
as a tall, elderly gentleman, with long white hair and beard, 
something like my grandfather, who was a very handsome old 
man. I thought of Him as standing yonder among the clouds, 
watching me, especially when I had been doing something 
wrong.” 

Dean Brown must have gotten crude religious ideas when he 
was a boy. The present writer was brought up in the country 
among humble folk, but he was taught the Bible, and also read 
it for himself, and he learned there very early that ‘‘God is a 
Spirit,” and because He is invisible, no earthly image of Him 
could or should be made. He learned from the Bible that no 
images of God should be made. But is it not pickayunish for 
men to go back to their crude conceptions of childhood to prove 
that men change their modes of thinking as they grow older? 
By pressing such an illustration, one would reach the point 
when nothing would be stable; one would have to change his 
religious faith every day. Growth in knowledge of the truth 
does not change the truth itself. What was true in our child- 
hood is true now. | 

Let us come to our author’s positive statements. He says: 
“Keeping one’s faith means the maintenance of a certain mood 
and bearing toward great spiritual verities.” 

Again we call attention to the fact that Dean Brown here 
uses the term “faith” in the subjective sense, whereas Paul used 
it in the objective sense, and it is so used by Dr. Brown in the 
title of his paper. His subject is “Keeping the Faith,” not, 
“Keeping Faith.” The question is, What was the body of truth 
that Paul meant by “the faith’? Therefore the discussion that 
follows in Dr. Brown’s essay is not relevant to his theme. The 


97 The Doctrines of Modernism 


question is not, Shall we believe something or become utterly 
agnostical ? but, What shall we believe in order to be Christians 
like Paul? Erudite men should be able to “stick to the subject.” 
Of course, there is nothing new in Dean Brown’s contention 
that all men must exercise faith in things in general or they 
cannot live in this world. Those things have been said from 
time immemorial by evangelical believers. 

But what is to be thought of Dr. Brown’s idea of even cube 
jective faith: ‘‘a certain mood and bearing toward great 
spiritual verities” ? There is the vagueness about it that usually 
marks the definitions of the Modernists. Is Christian faith 
simply a ‘‘mood” and a “bearing”? If so, it is a very shadowy 
thing. In order to show the difference in clarity between 
Modernism and Evangelicalism, we will quote a definition from 
one of our church catechisms: “Christian faith is personal trust 
in the Lord Jesus Christ alone for salvation.” ‘That certainly 
has nothing hazy about it. Christian faith ought not to be 
defined in ambiguous terms. It is something definite and tan- 
gible. It is simply trusting Christ as our personal Saviour, and 
that is so simple an act of the soul that everybody can under- 
stand it. We miss the clear and definite note in the writings of 
the generation which was not disciplined in the church cate- 
chisms. When they were children they must have conceived 
such crude ideas that it is little wonder they swing off to the 
extreme of liberalism. 

A sample quotation is here given pant the essay in question: 
“You may not be able to subscribe your name with intellectual 
honesty to the Nicene Creed, the Athanasian Creed, the West- 
minster Confession, and all the other great statements of belief, 
as certain men have done in days gone by. You may not be able 
tO announce as your own certain opinions you once held touch- 
ing a certain body of religious doctrine. But if you have kept 
that mood and bearing toward the sublime verities by which 
men live, and if you are able to answer back in terms of trust 
and obedience, of aspiration and high resolve, then you have 
kept the faith.” 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 93 


In this speech Dean Brown definitely aligns himself with 
the Modernists. He does not say positively that he rejects the 
Nicene Creed, but he surely means that its acceptance is not 
necessary to “keeping the faith.” But is not Dean Brown’s 
substitute rather nebulous? What are those “sublime verities by 
which men live’? If we are to believe something, we must 
know what it is. The Nicene Creed has the merit of saying in 
plain terms just what “‘the faith” is. It is not a mere “mood” or 
“bearing,” or “attitude,” but the acceptance of certain definite 
doctrines explicitly taught in God’s Word. Note the rhetorical 
character of Dr. Brown’s statement. But when we are dealing 
with such vital matters as what we must believe in order to be 
saved for time and eternity, we need clear, definite deliverances 
that all men of common intelligence can grasp. ‘Sublime verities 
by which men live” will not do when men are truly serious 
about their salvation. 

But a little further on, Dr. Brown, still highly rhetorical, 
does seem to become somewhat definite. He says: “Was there 
ever a time when so many people of all nations and kindreds 
and races and tongues looked up into the face of Jesus Christ 
and saw there the glory of the Eternal! Not merely a wise 
teacher, a lovely example, a powerful leader, but One who is 
Saviour, Redeemer and Lord!” 

But the trouble is, the statement is put in the form of a 
question. It would have been so much better, we think, to have 
said simply and clearly, the way to ‘‘keep the faith” is just to 
accept in full tonality the Christ of the Bible. But compare 
what Dean Brown says above with what he says on another 
page: “If you stand ready to adjust your life to the highest you 
see and feel and hope for, you will be keeping your faith mag- 
nificently.” That makes the Christian faith a very human 
thing. Even the agnostic might claim to be keeping the faith if 
that is all there is to it. But we are thankful to God that the 
Christian faith is something definite and tangible: it is trusting 
in the Christ of the Bible fully for salvation in time and 
eternity. If you get “Christ in you, the hope of glory,” you will 


94 The Doctrines of Modernism 


adjust your life to all that is highest and best as it is revealed 
in God’s Word. 

The numerous “flings” that our dean makes at the orthodox 
faith seem unkind and ungracious. Usually they are travesties 
of the reality, and seem to bear a scornful tone. He says that 
people today no longer believe in “‘the magic of prayer.” Well, 
evangelical Christians never did. Another side-thrust is that 
men today do not seek to “map out all the details of heaven 
and hell.”’ Neither did evangelical Christians ever do that. 
Speaking of a certain class of ministers, he observes: ‘Almost 
-all of them who had heads on their shoulders, and not merely 
places to wear their hats, had seen occasion many times to 
change their opinions touching some of the articles of belief.” 
He means to imply that orthodox people do not “have heads 
on their shoulders,” but only “places to wear their hats.” 
Imagine the smiles of smug, self-inflated superiority that passed 
around the audience as he said that. He girds at the men who 
once spoke of “brands snatched from the burning” and of 
rescuing men “from a sinking ship’ and getting them “into 
the ark of safety.” Note the self-satisfied air and the scoffing 
tone. He adds that today “modern” men are trying to “make 
seaworthy the ship itself.” This is bad logic, for by the 
“sinking ship’ of former days was meant the life of sin and 
carnal security. Even a Modernist would hardly want to make 
such a ship “seaworthy.” Oh! the bad logic of the Modern- 
ists: how much harm it does! 

Mark another piece of caricaturing: “Yet it is only yesterday 
that the chief purpose of religion in the minds of many people 
seemed to be the recovery out of a lost world of that small 
portion of it which might be saved.” 

What is the sense in indulging in such distortions? We con- 
fess that we do not know of ‘many people” who ever held such 
views. The Calvinists may have held that they must gather out 
the elect, but they never thought they would be a small number. 
At any rate, such flings at the Christian Church in general are 
most unworthy and extremely harmful. Evangelical Christians 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 95 


always have believed that men must be saved individually, and 
they believe that now, for you cannot herd men into the king- 
dom of Christ en masse like a lot of cattle or sheep; but there 
has never been a time when the orthodox church in general 
has not felt the need of bringing as many people as possible 
into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. 

Dean Brown has much to say in his essay about “opinions.” 
Is “keeping the faith” merely a matter of human opinion? Nay! 
According to Paul, it is holding fast to a special revelation from 
Jesus Christ (Gal. 1:11, 12). Read these verses, and see what 
Paul meant by ‘“‘keeping the faith.” 

“The final test is that of experience,” avers Dr. Brown. Yes! 
But a Modernist means by “experience” his own “thinking,” 
his own “opinions,” his own “aspirations after that which is 
highest and best.” An evangelical Christian means by ‘“exper- 
ience”’ the direct assurance of pardon and salvation vouchsafed 
to his inner consciousness when he is regenerated by the Holy 
Spirit, according to the teaching of the Word of God. It is an 
experience that comes to him through the Bible—a Biblically be- 
gotten experience.* ‘Therefore, it does not turn on the Bible and 
pick it to pieces, as do the Modernists. True Christian experi- 
ence does not make the Bible true: it attests that the Bible zs 
true. And that is the faith which the real Christian believer is 
determined to keep to the end. 


“The Religion of a Liberal Christian” 


The above is the title of an article by Dr. Henry Van Dyke, 
which appeared in The Outlook, New York, for January 30, 
1924. We shall notice seriatim several points which he discusses. 

He asks the question why Christians never seem nearer one 
another than when they are singing together the best of the 
old church hymns. He suggests as the principal reason the fol- 
lowing: “The really fine hymns have no theological definitions 
in them. They utter pure emotion in the language of simple 


*Cf. 1 Pet. 1:23: “Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incor- 
ruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth forever.” 


96 The Doctrines of Modernism 


faith.” This statement he thinks so important that he prints it 
in italics. Then he cites some of the favorite old hymns of the 
right kind. | 

First he mentions, ‘““How firm a foundation.” It is true, this 
hymn, which all evangelical Christians love, contains no formal 
and technical theological definitions; but it certainly is based 
throughout on a very decided and positive theology, which could 
hardly be held so joyfully and earnestly without clear and 
correct definitions. Note the first two lines: “How firm a 
foundation, ye saints of the Lord, is laid for your faith in His 
excellent Word.” On what great doctrine is that couplet 
founded that makes it such an appealing and singable Christian 
hymn? Where is this firm foundation laid? ‘In His excellent 
Word.” That can refer only to the Bible. Therefore, if we 
want to find the firm foundation of our Christian faith, we must 
look for it in the Bible. But suppose the Bible is an errant book, 
could we sing with much confidence about the “firm founda- 
tion”? Here, it is true, is no definition of the doctrine of Holy 
Scripture, but it is based on a definition, and a correct one. 
This truth is made all the more forcible by the next two lines, 
which are as follows: ‘What more can He say than to you 
He hath said, who unto the Saviour for refuge have fled?’ Here 
is an expression that is founded on the doctrine of the sufficiency 
of the Holy Scriptures—another theological definition. 

The next hymn mentioned by Dr. Van Dyke is Charles 
Wesley’s “Jesus, Lover of my soul.” What is the great theme 
of this standard hymn, so full of true devotion? It is the love of 
Christ as shown in His character and atoning work. Turn to 
your evangelical theology, as Wesley himself must have done in 
thought, and see whether the love of Christ is not defined in 
essence just as it is represented rhythmically in this hymn. Sal- 
vation by grace alone is taught in this hymn: “Other refuge 
have I none; hangs my helpless soul on Thee; “Plenteous 
grace with Thee is found: Grace to cover all my sin.” Such 
definite expressions are not the result of ambiguous thinking, but 
of clear doctrinal conceptions. The Wesleys were theologians 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 97 


as well as Christians with a clear and definite experience. If 
you want to find the basis of the Wesleyan hymnology read the 
“Institutes of Theology” by John Wesley and note the pre- 
ciseness of his theological definitions: and, of course, Charles 
Wesley held the same theology as his brother. 

The other hymns that Dr. Van Dyke cites are all surcharged 
with definite and correct doctrine, all drawn from the Bible 
and all in harmony with the exact definitions given in the 
evangelical theologies. Of course, hymnology is not to be put in 
didactic form, as if worshippers were in a class-room, but in 
order to give true and clear expression to spiritual experience 
they must have a didactic foundation. They cannot be helpful 
if they soar about in mistland, without “a habitation and a 
name.” 

But why this opposition to theological definitions? What is 
theology? It is the data of religion examined, correlated and 
systematized in scientific form. Why do people who dote so 
much today on science in every other realm want no science in 
religion? They panegyrize the sciences of chemistry, physics, 
biology, botany, psychology and ethics, but they want religion in 
its unclassified and inchoate condition, “without form and void.” 
They use the illustration about the flower; analyze the flower 
and you kill it. The illustration will not hold good: first, people 
who know flowers scientifically are able, other things being 
equal, to appreciate the wonder and beauty of every flower even 
more than those who have no systematic knowledge, yes, they see 
and feel the significance of the “‘little flower in the crannied 
wall” all the more, if they know much scientifically about plant 
life. Second, religion is not that kind of a principle that dies 
when it is analyzed. The flower is material; religion is spiritual, 
and spiritual things are not so easily destroyed. The writer of 
these lines would make no invidious comparisons, but he feels 
warranted in saying that one of the most spiritually-minded 
Christians he has ever known was also one of the greatest syste- 
matic theologians he has ever known; a man of the simplest and 
most beautiful Christian faith. His theology did not impair his 


98 The Doctrines of Modernism 


religion. Nor did he ever commit the logical fallacies of so 
many of the Modernists of the day. 

This habit of the liberalists of scouting at theological science 
and then lauding physical science is not consistent. “Theology 
is simply the science of religion. Since religion is all but uni- 
versal, and is perhaps, the world over, the most dominant 
force among men, the reasoning mind seeks to correlate all its © 
data, and assemble them into a science. Someone said something 
like this some years ago: “I love flowers, but I hate botany! I 
love the stars, but I abominate astronomy! I love religion, but I 
despise theology!” He proved it by his one-sided religion and 
erratic manners. Why not be all-sided, and say we love both— 
both the things themselves and the science of them? It is this 
lack of a full-orbed view that is creating much of the trouble in 
the church and the world today. 

This fact is proved by a statement in the latter part of Dr. 
Van Dyke’s article, where he says: “You don’t need to swallow 
a volume of theological definitions. Simply come to Him, trust 
Him fully, follow Him honestly, and you shall be saved. That 
is gospel truth.” 

Well, that is the dogmatic way of putting things. It is like 
saying, “I have said it, and so it is, and so it must be.” In the 
second place, it is cluttering at a man of straw. Nobody ever 
held that a person must “swallow a volume of theological 
definitions” in order to be saved. The criticism is really child- 
ish. We have read scores of works on systematic theology, but 
have never known an author, however scholastic, to hold that 
a technical knowledge of scientific theology is necessary to sal- 
vation. You might also say: “You don’t need to swallow a 
volume of biological definitions in order to live; all you need to 
do is to eat, drink, breathe, etc.” ‘That would be true, but why 
should one make the statement, as if to imply that biological 
science is of no value? 

We shall even venture to give this critic of theological science 
an elementary lesson in theology. The text-book on theology 
which the present writer has used for some years in his seminary 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 99 


differentiates between “simple faith” and “discursive faith.” 
The former is what the word ‘“‘simple”’ means, simple trust in 
Christ, and is necessary to salvation; the latter is faith examined 
and analyzed, and is necessary, not to salvation, but for science. 
What would have become of simple faith in the history of the 
world had it not been for the scientific theologians who have 
defined and defended the Christian religion and preserved it in 
its apostolic integrity? Suppose that Athanasius had been indif- 
ferent in his day to “theological definitions.” Christianity would 
have been contaminated at its very fountain head with Arianism, 
which made Christ a demigod, and thus all who worshipped 
Him would have been idolaters. 

Dr. Van Dyke does not like the terms Modernist and Funda- 
mentalist; he would change the nomenclature to ‘‘Liberalist’’ 
and “Literalist.”” While he dislikes “theological definitions,” he 
rather likes to make definitions of his own when it suits his pur- 
pose. But he does not see that the names he prefers are de- 
fective: first, because the Liberalists are often far from liberal; 
second, because the conservatives are not literalists of the ex- 
treme type that Dr. Van Dyke describes. We believe, however, 
that the terms currently used, while not exact as to every par- 
ticular, are sufficiently understood to answer all practical pur- 
poses. Then, we might say that there are Modernists who 
swing to the extreme left wing, and there are some Funda- 
mentalists who swing to the extreme right wing. As a rule, 
however, there is much more divergence of view among the 
Modernists than among the Fundamentalists. The former vary 
from Dr. Van Dyke himself to Potter and Guthrie. To our 
mind, there is considerable difference between Van Dyke and 


Fosdick. 
Lax Views of the Bible 


But let us note what Dr. Van Dyke has to say about the 
Bible. Speaking for himself and the liberalists of his class, he 
says: ““They take the Bible as a true record of man’s search for 
- God and God’s progressive revelation to man; not an inerrant 


100 The Doctrines of Modernism 


text-book of science and history, but a sure guide of faith and 
conduct.” 

Will that statement bear the searchlight? Is the Bible ‘a 
true record of man’s search for God’? Where does the Bible 
indicate that it records such a search? Where does it imply 
that such was its first, or even one of its principal, purposes? 
Remember, Dr. Van Dyke places this first. Looking at the 
Biblical record just as it is, and not as we imagine it to be, 
does it not contain much more of a record of man’s sins against 
God and his departures from His commandments than of his 
earnest seeking after God? At all events, the dominant factor 
in Biblical teaching is that it is a progressive revelation to man, 
and so Dr. Van Dyke should have placed that factor first and 
given it the chief emphasis. 

A thrust at the conservatives is made in the statement that 
the Bible is “not an inerrant text-book of science and history.” 
By such caricatures do the liberalists try to smirch and distort 
the doctrines of the conservatives. No one holds that the Bible 
is a “text-book of science and history.” ‘The Bible is God’s 
special revelation to man, and the God who thus reveals Him- 
self is the ‘God of the whole earth,’ the Creator of the cosmos. 
Therefore He would be likely to reveal those things about both 
nature and religion that man cannot discover for himself. It is 
probable that such a revelation would touch the natural world 
at many places, even though it would not become a technical 
text-book. Now, what do conservative Christian scholars hold? 
That the Bible, although not a text-book of science and history, 
teaches truth, and not falsehood, whenever it touches on the 
natural domain and whenever it records history. If it is God’s 
book, and God is the God of both nature and salvation, it surely 
cannot be errant in either sphere. If it is “‘a sure guide of faith 
and conduct,’ and has been given of God, why would He mix 
His instructions in one sphere with a lot of errors in the other 
spheres? If God permitted the Biblical writers to err so egre- 
giously in interpreting nature, He may have allowed them to 
err in the matter of “faith and conduct.” On that score, who 


Modernism and Evangelical Christianity 101 


could be sure? If one reads the Bible without bias, he sees that 
God nowhere divorces the natural: life from the religious life. 
The simple empirical fact is, nature and grace both belong to 
God, for He is the Creator of the one and the Author of the 
other. 

So if He gives us a Book that is authoritative in one sphere, 
it ought to be authoritative in the other as far as it gives any 
teaching. At this point we desire to say that, after many 
years of investigation, we believe that there is no discrepancy 
at any point between the true interpretation of the Bible and 
the actual findings of science. This is just as it should be, be- 
cause God is the Creator of the cosmos and the Author of the 
Bible. May God keep His Church true to His Holy Word! 





Other Books by Dr. Keyser 


The Rational Test: Bible Doctrine 
Attested by Reason 
The United Lutheran Publication House, 
Philadelphia, Pa. Price 75 cents 
This book shows “the sweet reasonableness” of the 
cardinal doctrines of Christianity. 


A System of Christian Evidence 
The Lutheran Literary Board, Pubs., Burling- 
ton, Iowa. Price $1.75 
This is the third revised and enlarged edition of 
this work. It is used as a text-book in many colleges 
and Bible schools. 


Contending for the Faith 
George H. Doran Company, New York 
Price $2.00 
In this work, which is both constructive and analyti- 
cal, the rationalistic Biblical critics, the evolutionists, 
and the materialistic scientists are brought before 
the bar of Scripture and reason. 


Man’s First Disobedience 
The Macmillan Company, New York. Price 
$1.00 
How did sin and suffering come into the world, and 
why were they permitted are the questions answered 
in this volume. ‘The Biblical account of the Fall 
of man is constructively interpreted as an historical 
narrative. A most timely book. 


All these books may be ordered of 
THE BIBLE INSTITUTE COLPORTAGE ASSOCIATION 
826 N. La Salle Street, Chicago, IIl. 


Date Due 






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